


Summertide

by russianhousedj



Series: summerverse [1]
Category: Video Blogging RPF, supermega
Genre: AU, Alcohol, Angst, Arguing, Domestic, Eventual Fluff, First Kiss, Implied/Referenced Drug Use, Internalized Homophobia, M/M, Non-Graphic Violence, Rebellious!Ryan, References to Depression, Religion, Religious!Matt, Slow Burn, So much angst, slight nsfw but no actual smut
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-27
Updated: 2018-10-17
Packaged: 2019-06-17 01:54:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 67,388
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15450813
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/russianhousedj/pseuds/russianhousedj
Summary: Matt has grown up sheltered and kept in a protective bubble that isn’t very welcoming to outsiders. Being the pastor's son, he isn’t one to look for trouble. It’s such a dull and safe routine that it makes it all the more startling when suddenly, one day, trouble manages to find him first.





	1. The Remnants of a Bombshell

**Author's Note:**

> well. it's finally here. i've been working on this for a while now and i'm really excited to share it. there's a couple quick things, first!
> 
> 1- i used to be religious, although i'm not anymore. matt's views in this fic are not meant to represent or attack anyone else's beliefs or experiences with religion. i hope i don't offend anyone- this is all a made-up story.
> 
> 2- officer falcone in this chapter is based on a real person. tom falcone is a music photographer that could probably not be less associated with supermega, but i like his work and think that he's neat. [here](http://www.thomasfalcone.com/) is his photography website if you're curious! just thought i'd mention that.
> 
> 3- thanks to autumn aka [greatwonfidence](http://greatwonfidence.tumblr.com/) on tumblr and ao3 for beta'ing this first chapter for me (even if it was forever ago)! she's a super talented writer and artist, and you should def check her out. pls & thx

The first rumble from somewhere outside the church sounds something like thunder, and Matt’s initial thought is that he’s bound to finally be smited by God himself for all the sins he’s committed. He stands solid and stagnant in his place, awaiting some horrendous end, before hearing yet another crash. The sound doesn't jolt him quite as much as it did the first time around, though, and with a little more common sense, Matt reasons that it probably wasn't some punishing strike from God, but something that sounded very much like the metal garbage bins around the back of the building. 

He first assumes it's some wild animal scrounging for some leftover communion scraps, and tentatively turns to glance at the double doors leading out back, knowing that he should probably investigate the source of the commotion. However, Matt hasn't ever been particularly interested in interacting with animals, especially potentially feral and ravenous ones. There isn't even anything around that he could think to fend it off with, either- not unless he’s keen on batting away a twenty pound raccoon with the Holy Bible.

A couple minutes of anticipatory silence tick by as Matt listens for another sound to startle the quiet fall of dusk. The sanctuary, however, remains silent still, and it’s not too long since the whole ordeal has sprung that Matt begins to develop a desire to abandon his mission of defending the helpless garbage cans altogether. It's totally possible that whatever’s out there has already fled the scene, anyway, right? He wants to believe it, sure, for his own sake, but he can’t help but think: what if it didn't? And what if God is watching Matt _right this second_ , questioning his integrity and his faith and putting this moment on a long, long checklist of things Matt has done that are going to land him a place in Hell? 

Despite maybe subconsciously knowing his thought process is a bit ridiculous, Matt shudders all the same. Whenever his mind wanders off, his thoughts always seem to go to the same place, to saunter back to the same ideas his dad had drilled in his head- thoughts that if he's not always loyal to the church and everything it represents, then God’s wrath will come for him. Sure, he's noticed that he's been _scared_ into being obedient rather than actually been taught to believe in it, but he's always remained too afraid to question it, of challenging an idea only to possibly end up on the losing side of the argument.

For a moment, Matt thinks that he should maybe notify his father of his predicament, but he knows well that the pastor hates being pulled from his work, especially when he's writing one of his sermons. There aren’t any better options left- Matt decides it’ll be best to just get it over with, to save the building from a possible rat infestation, or whatever it is, all by himself. 

As he creeps towards the back of the building, nearing the emergency exits over to the right of the altar, he safely decides _against_ grabbing a bible or hymnal to defend himself with. It’s painful to only _imagine_ some scenario of having to awkwardly explain to his father why there are teeth marks in the Old Testament.

When he hesitantly cracks open one of the back doors to reveal the backside of the sanctuary, the faint light spilling out of the church doesn’t reveal any possum or other rodent of some sort that’s clawing its way through the trash at all. Matt finds a small sliver of relief to bask in for that, at least, though his worries are far from put to rest. Instead of a hungry animal, there are a couple spray paint cans strewn on the ground, and the noisy garbage bins that have been tipped to spill out the trash inside. It's all a sort of unsightly trail leading up to a pair of worn and ripped black sneakers that are standing in front of the church’s back wall- and, of course, the body that’s attached to them. 

He’s scared. He feels meek and stupid and terrified, and he really can’t help it at all. Matt is privileged and cradled, so danger is often far off and somewhere else, no where close enough for Matt to accidentally get tangled into. It’s this realization he has that suddenly renders his briefly mustered courage useless- discovering that he’s been presented with this alarmingly new and troublesome situation, and that he isn't sure what move to make first. This relatively small frame of his admittedly holds nothing but cowardice, and the courage he could desperately use to entertain the idea of confrontation is nowhere to be found. Matt can already imagine he’d be pummeled into the pavement within seconds if he dared even a single challenging _glance_ at this guy that’s desecrating the back wall of the church.

The typical plan of action Matt usually calls upon when dealing with conflict is to first pray, and second, ask his dad for help. Sometimes, he’ll even pray another time shortly after, if it seems necessary. And so it seems, in his frozen state of unwaning nerves, watching on as the dark figure with a gloomy expression shakes a can of spray paint in those profane hands of his, Matt is quickly coming to terms with the fact that he doesn’t actually have any other plans in mind, nor did he ever. 

Cautiously, it takes more time than it maybe should for Matt to stalk back into the holy haven of the church in reverse, his steps tedious and quiet. And it’s valuable _minutes_ before Matt can convince his father’s scowl of, “Is it _really_ that important, Matthew?” to follow him back to the same glowing red exit sign situated to the left of the altar. By the time Matt is finally heading out the back doors again, confidently with the priest now in tow, it seems the outsider has long since vanished, leaving behind only his litter and a less than church-appropriate spray painted tag on the brick wall as unsightly reminders. 

In a sheepish and sorry daze, Matt offers a vaguely helpful description of the culprit to the pastor - dark hair, a black cap, those torn sneakers, endlessly angry eyes - in hopes that things will be sorted out by the next service. And when his father has finally wrapped up in the office later into the night, and Matt is at last settled safe and secure back in his bedroom at home, he can’t help but feel the worry he’d been harboring begin to slip away from him with ease. After all, his father assured him that he’d “handle it,” and that, “God doesn't allow people who defile His house to go unpunished.” And when has his dad, or God, ever been wrong?

\--

“Morning, Matthew,” Officer Falcone greets him gruffly just a couple days later, planted in the front parking lot of the church with his usual authoritative stance- stern yet oddly charming expression, back straight, hands on his hips. Today, though, there’s only one hand on his hip, as the other has a firm grip on some guy that Matt can only describe as a criminal. He thinks it's fair to make that assumption here, anyway, considering he's being held by a local officer, with a scowl that doesn't seem to portray that he's here by his own free will.

“Pastor here was telling me you saw some wrongdoings the other night, but didn't get around to stopping whoever it was.” Falcone continues, and Matt suddenly understands why his father called to meet him here. Matt takes another rather reluctant look at the lawbreaker, and manages to avoid eye contact as he scans him up and down. Nothing about him stands out as particularly familiar at first, but as Matt takes in the torn hat, the furrowed brows and dark eyes, and the worn look of his sneakers, the resemblance strikes him in a bit of a rush. Timidly, Matt averts his eyes as he recognizes the rebellious boy from the other night. He might even subconsciously shuffle a little closer to his father in search of an ounce more of protection, just to try and escape the dread that’s begun to plague him.

It takes a bit of gathered nerve to actually dare a glance back up at the stranger’s eyes, and Matt can’t say he expected to be met with anything beyond a snarling glare. Surprisingly, however, Matt is quick to note this guy isn’t looking back at him at all. His gaze is wandering elsewhere, taking in his surroundings with a lax sense of apathy that really doesn't seem to be helping his case with Falcone. 

“So,” the officer interrupts Matt’s briefly derailed train of thought, “Is this the guy you saw?”

There’s this fear that wells up in Matt, then, as he expects the stranger would register him on a presumably long list of enemies if Matt were to admit that he bore witness to his crime. Despite it all, though, Matt figures that, whatever he might do, it couldn’t be any more terrifying than God’s punishment for Matt if he lied about what he saw. Timidly, he nods his head to confirm Falcone’s suspect as the culprit.

“Are you sure it was just him?” Matt’s father interjects curtly, “Don't delinquents like this usually have accomplices?”

Falcone shakes his head knowingly. “No, not this one. All his friends have grown out of this childish habit by now- either that or high-tailed it out of here to actually do something useful with their time. Isn't that right, Ryan? All your friends ran off to leave you all alone?” He emphasizes his question with a tug on Ryan’s arm, jostling him in a way that he most likely figures will help draw an answer out of him. The scowling boy doesn't, however, end up answering with anything more than an indignant roll of his eyes.

“So what do you suggest we do with him, then?” the priest questions, seemingly growing impatient with the lack of consequence as the minutes tick on. Matt knows he must be itching to get back to work; he hates to be pulled from his religious rhythm.

“Well, I’ve given him too many warnings at this point, so we’re going to see if some community service will help whip him into shape at all. I don't have the time to constantly watch over him though, so his supervision will be managed by the good of the church, if I’m not mistaken?”

Matt watches as his dad nods his head in agreement, and Falcone nods back, and suddenly he's wondering why he's still standing there, awkwardly planted outside the chapel amongst a priest, a cop, and a delinquent. Something’s telling him that he doesn't really belong in this scenario, but soon enough, his father is assuring him that he most certainly does.

He’s not sure what he figured the priest would say to him as he turned to Matt with an expectant look and a furrowed brow, but, “You’re going to accompany this young man on his path to recovery. Oversee his service hours, and maybe even instill a bit of Christ’s teachings in him along the way,” is definitely not it at all. 

Of course, the first and most overwhelming thought that springs to Matt’s mind is the urge to argue, because he truly can’t see the sense in being asked to watch over the person he didn’t even have the gut to confront in the first place. What if this Ryan character is too much for him to handle? What if he gets _violent?_ Matt gets queasy over paper cuts, and rescues the moths that fly into the house in paper cups before his mother can swat away at them. Maybe he vaguely understands his father’s _intent_ behind all of this, but surely, out of everyone in town, there are much better, less pathetic candidates for the job.

Before he can even shoot his dad an uneasy glance, though, the beginnings of fruitless resistance, the pastor is continuing with a phrase, or rather just a single name, that always seems to end any and all thoughts of defiance that Matt may have in him.

“I believe God wants you to do this.” He says, and he’s eyeing Matt with this bold and hardened stare. 

If Matt thought there could be even a sliver of a chance of escaping this fate, he’s quickly coming to terms with the fact now that he’s been certainly mistaken. Whenever his dad begins to go on about God’s plans for Matt, insisting him of his spiritual callings, he must know it instills this unshakeable fear and hesitation in his son; and, unremarkably enough, he mentions those things quite a lot. Matt figures that he must know of how easy it is to get him, always the coward at the mention of God’s name, meekly complying and praying on his knees.

There’s no easy way out of his predicament, and as Matt realizes this, he opts to quit wasting everyone’s time. He nods obediently, albeit reluctantly, to his father, complying with his admittedly awful plans. Falcone goes on to go over the details, making it all too real- the time, the expectations of Ryan, and how long it’ll all play out for. Matt freezes up for a moment as he hears the words, “through the rest of the summer,” and inwardly gives a short, dismal send-off to whatever free time he barely managed to have. Although babysitting an angry felon might initially _sound_ more welcome of an activity than whatever droning bible study camp Matt’s father might’ve signed him up for instead, this still is not his first choice of leisure activity.

It’s not his choice at all, though, and he’s just learning to have to live with others dictating aspects of his life for him.

\--

Every Wednesday and Saturday afternoon, Matt is to better the community by aiding and supervising an ornery lawbreaker in his community service hours. As he stands on the sidewalk just outside of the church’s front entrance, though, sweating in his short sleeved button-down that’s done all the way up to the collar, he hopes that with every Wednesday and Saturday, Ryan won’t continue to be as late as he is today.

Falcone is waiting outside with him, just to be sure Ryan even bothers to show up at all. Matt feels endlessly uncomfortable as they both stand around wordlessly, but he can’t muster up anything intelligent or useful to say to the officer no matter how hard he wracks his brain. He’s never been very good around adults, but knows if he were to tell his mother that, she’d scoff and tell him that _he’s_ technically been considered an adult as well for going on three years now, so he’d better start acting like one. 

Just as Matt’s going to heed his mom’s echoing nagging and awkwardly comment on the sweltering weather, he catches sight of a vaguely familiar mess of dark hair making way toward the church. And for as much as he’d been dreading this, he’s awfully relieved for Ryan to alleviate him from the unpleasant silence with Officer Falcone.

“Well, look who decided to finally show up,” Falcone sneers once Ryan is within earshot, though the felon wears a growingly familiar mask of apathy and acts as though he doesn’t really seem to be listening. Without giving him a chance to explain himself, though it didn’t seem Ryan had much interest in doing so anyway, Falcone begins to go over the basics of how Matt’s day should pan out. Matt muses that there really couldn’t be enough to prepare him for an afternoon alone with a criminal, but listens in attentively anyway.

“No biting, no scratching, and none of your illegal bullshit, alright? I’ve had it with locking you up all the time, and at this point, you’re really wasting my time, Magee.”

Ryan rolls his eyes, as if he’s heard this kind of spiel countless times before. “I’m not a fucking _dog_ , Tom.”

“Yeah? Then stop making me have to clean up after you. Is it really that hard to just put the spray paint away and stop trespassing?”

“As if that’s the only kind of trouble I get into. It’s insulting to hear you downplay me like that, really.”

Falcone narrows his eyes at Ryan’s words, and Matt feels a little nervous as the cop’s lip twitches irritably. “I mean it, Magee. No fuckin’ around this time, alright? Our hope is that maybe this kid can teach you to do some good. And remember that if you keep your record clear for long enough, we’ll excuse some of your more expensive charges. You got that?”

It sounds like a good deal to Matt, though he’s never faced the legal system firsthand before and may not be the best judge of a decent sentence when he hears one. Ryan still looks like he may not be all for it, but eventually rolls his eyes and scoffs a quiet, “Whatever,” that Matt can only assume is a sign of unenthusiastic approval. And not too long after, just like that, Falcone is driving off in one of the town’s squad cars, and Matt is tentatively stood with a stormy, unruly stranger. 

However, not for very long.

As soon as Falcone’s tail lights disappear back down over the hill of Juniper Street, winding away from the church and diminishing Matt’s sense of safety, Ryan wordlessly turns in the other direction, making way towards some back roads that Matt has never been down before. A little startled, Matt knows it must be part of his duty to figure out where the guy’s going, or to follow him and see what he’s up to- but he’s admittedly still shaken up solely from being in relatively close quarters with him. Is he _really_ up for willingly chasing after someone so scary?

There’s a decent distance between the two of them now, though, so Matt tucks away his feeble fears for as long as he can manage and figures it’s fairly safe enough to call down the street after him and ask what’s going on.

“Hey, um, wh-where are you going?” Matt stumbles over his words like the timid fool he is, but can’t manage any embarrassment for it. It’s most likely clear enough to Ryan as it is that Matt isn’t exactly fond of him, let alone anything but slightly terrified at the prospect of spending time near a lawless criminal.

“Away from here.” Ryan replies stonily, and Matt watches as he reaches into his pocket for a pack of cigarettes, smoke pluming away from his figure not too long after. He doesn’t slow or even turn back around to look at Matt, and in that moment Matt can’t feel anything but utterly meek, stupid, and helpless. Largely unsure of what to do, Matt takes a brief moment to weigh his equally unfavorable options. On one hand, he could try his luck and follow after Ryan to fulfill his responsibilities. It’s no secret, however, that he feels much safer remaining just outside of the holy church and not wandering into the rougher side of town after the one person he’d really rather not spend his time around.

He’s nearly made up his mind before he stops for a second, and considers the consequences, weighing his other choice. If he doesn’t chase after him, what is he meant to say to his dad once the day is over? It’s never a good idea to disappoint his father; Matt often never hears the end of it, or at least just feels morosely guilty about whatever he’s done for the next week or so, which is a punishment in and of itself. In a vain yet reluctant, and most probably idiotic, attempt to remain on the pastor’s good side for at least a little while longer, Matt makes the hasty decision to stop being so unsure about everything he ever does, and just make the move.

He goes after Ryan, who has only managed to walk some fifty feet away during Matt’s internal moral dilemma, so there’s plenty of time for Matt to catch up to him. He does, however keep a safe distance between them as he trails along behind him, just in case he, God forbid, were to need to suddenly make a run for it. He surely hopes it won’t come to that, if mainly for the fact that when Matt tried out for cross country on account of his long legs, he quickly learned that they were more of a hazard than an asset.

For a long while, it’s painfully silent. They pass by the old shut down middle school, and the furniture shop with more faded liquidation sale signs than any customers, before Ryan finally speaks up. He’s headed across the train tracks when he says, “You’re wasting your time following me around, you know. I’m not actually going to do what Falcone says.” Matt can hear the scowl in his voice, but somehow still feels brave enough to quip back.

“Well, if you don’t, then I’ll… I-I’ll tell my dad.” He threatens apprehensively.

Ryan scoffs, voice grumbling and lethargic. “I don’t care.” 

“He’ll tell Officer Falcone.”

“I don’t _care_.” Ryan repeats.

Matt feels his offense weakening as he realizes just how little respect Ryan has for the law, or for seemingly anything. It admittedly should have occurred to him sooner, but he thought the least he could do is try and persuade Ryan into just doing the right thing. It seems, though, that he’s going to need to try a lot harder than this.

“What if he gets you in trouble?” Matt tries next, and though he doesn’t _appreciate_ the glare Ryan turns his head around to aim at him, he at least deems it as a necessary start to actually communicating. It’s the first time they’ve actually made, albeit uncomfortable, eye contact since they met.

“Do you really think that asshole will do anything?” Ryan asks in disbelief, unnoticing of the way Matt winces slightly at the curse word. He’s never been permitted by his parents to curse himself, and has since grown a general distaste for others doing it throughout the years. But he knows better than to let others find that out by whining about it.

“Tom’s known me for years,” Ryan continues with his back now to Matt once again, “They used to keep me in holding cells when I did shit, until they realized it wasn’t doing any good. Now they keep ‘catching me’ just to tell me do more service hours, which I never do. It’s just a stupid cycle, nothing’s gonna change anytime soon.”

It’s the most Matt has heard the other boy talk since they first informally met the other day, and though it’s not the world’s most pleasant conversation, he feels compelled to keep it going. Or, in other words, nag and press just a little while longer.

“Why don’t you just do what you’re told?” Matt asks, cringing at how much he sounds like the innocent, obedient little pastor’s son that he is in that very moment. In _every_ moment. It’s naive of him to think that whatever problems this guy clearly has could all be solved just by adhering to Falcone’s orders for once, but he figures that, at the very least, it couldn’t hurt.

“What, like doing the service hours or whatever?”

“Yeah.”

“This community never did anything for me, why should I do something for it?” 

“I don’t know, to be a good person?”

Ryan groans in annoyance. “Look, I know that you love to listen to your God telling you what to do and how to act all the time, but that’s really not how the world works. I’ve done all that before, being nice to people and being a good person. But I got taken advantage of and shit on and I don’t really feel like going there again.”

Silence settles between the two as they continue walking along then, because Matt didn’t expect such a vibrant and harshly honest answer. And Matt could keep challenging Ryan’s resistance, but he’s beginning to feel as though there’s not much more that he could say to try and convince such an angry person to lighten up a little. Matt is in the middle of wondering what, or who, maybe, Ryan is so angry at when he’s startled out of his thoughts by almost running into the miscreant.

He mumbles a sheepish, “Sorry,” and takes a decent step back, keeping his distance warily. For a moment, he begins to wonder why it is they stopped at all, but doesn’t have much time to ponder it before Ryan answers his question before he can even ask it.

“Well, congratulations, you’ve trailed behind me like a pathetic lost puppy all the way to my house. Is this what you wanted?” Ryan’s harboring a disgruntled frown, the same one that seems to have pointedly remained all throughout their journey from the church. Matt figures it must be a staple of his “bad boy” look and attitude; either that, or it’s so practiced at this point that Ryan doesn’t even realize he’s doing it.

Matt looks over to the ivy-covered building that Ryan had lazily gestured to, and takes in the disheveled looking mess with as blank of an expression as he can manage. The roof overhang is sagging with the moss it’s covered in, the concrete steps are cracked and crumbling at the corners, and the windows are tinted a grimy brown due to the caked-on dirt on the glass. It’s difficult not to think too much about his trimmed and pristine two-story back in the nice development by the church. 

This isn’t what he wanted at all, though, didn’t seek to inadvertently invade Ryan’s privacy like this.

“N-No, I…” He stutters, but can’t seem to find the right words to explain himself in his embarrassed haste. With a deep breath in, he sighs at himself and starts once more. “Look, I’m not trying to like… ruin your life or anything. I’m just doing what I’m told.”

“Yeah, and you’re wasting your time.”

“Can’t you at least just _try_ it? Just one thing to fill some service hours? It’ll be easy, I’ll make it interesting, or something. Could be fun, even? I’ll try not to, um, pester you so much if you do. And you won’t even have to-,”

“ _Jesus_ , will you- will you shut the hell up if I say yes?” Ryan interjects begrudgingly, and Matt’s hopeful ears think that his words sound less full of anger and more cushioned by reluctant resignation.

Matt nods his head quickly in agreement. “Yes,” He says, optimistic for Ryan’s compliance.

It seems as though Ryan is pondering his response for a moment, before he eventually rolls his eyes and gives into Matt’s unfaltering innocence, offering him a, “Fucking _fine_ ,” in vexed agreement. 

“What’re my options?” He then asks, staring down at his nails to pick at them disinterestedly. Off to a pleasant start.

“We could… Oh, how about you help work on the prayer garden? Marigolds are in season so we could plant some of those, and there’s also some weeding that could be done, so you-,”

“Fine.” Ryan grunts tersely, as if just to get Matt’s insistence to finally _stop_. It doesn’t manage to break Matt’s spirit, though, and he just barely succeeds in repressing his growing smile of triumph as his face lights up with glee. 

“But I’m not walking all the way back there now. You’re just going to have to wait until Wednesday.”

“Yeah, th-that’s okay. Um… you have to promise you’ll actually show up though, okay?” Matt hardly waits for reassurance before tacking on a hopeful, “Please?” to potentially sway Ryan.

Ryan huffs, but Matt thinks he catches a glimmer of a - potentially sarcastic - grin as he does so. “Sure,” comes his response, and he leaves Matt with nothing more as he moves to retreat into his ramshackle home. Matt admits that he’s feeling accomplished, and maybe a little _too_ proud of himself for his own good, but the glory of the small victory stays with him for the rest of the day. It stays as he decides to return back home as well, and as he takes a detour to stop at the local garden shop along the way.

\--

The skies are pleasantly overcast by the time Wednesday rolls around, and there’s even an occasional breeze here and there. Matt thinks it’s probably the best weather they could have asked for during a day of getting down and digging in the dirt. Well, it’s the best weather _Matt_ could have asked for. Because Ryan cursed at the idea of even _touching_ a spade as soon as he showed, and hasn’t gotten up from under the shade of one of the magnolia trees since. And Matt thought it was supposed to be _his_ community service.

“Don’t you want to help out?” Matt asks somewhat indignantly, taking a break from weeding to wipe at his hairline that’s collecting sweat. So far he’s planted what he hopes will be neat little bundles of daisies, dahlias, and marigolds in a few month’s time, and even polished up one of the laughing cherub statues that’s sat next to the bird bath. Ryan however, has accomplished nothing other than driving Matt just a little mad with how laxly he watches someone else do his work for him.

“No, I don’t.”

“You don’t have to be a jerk.” Matt sighs frustratedly, though he’s not entirely sure why he expected things to play out any differently than this. 

“If you’re going to bitch at me this whole time, you know I could always just leave.” Ryan says with a raise of his eyebrow, and he even goes as far as to begin standing from his comfortably shaded spot.

“No, don’t! I…” Matt stops him, and he surprises himself with the way his voice raises a little, not entirely sure of why he’s suddenly so keen on keeping Ryan around. If he did leave, the pastor and Falcone would probably understand how he couldn’t manage to keep someone so rowdy and rebellious settled down for even an afternoon, and wouldn’t likely be _too_ angry with him for failing. And once Ryan had moved on to do something most likely illegal somewhere else, he wouldn’t be Matt’s problem or responsibility anymore- fresh out of his hair. 

So why does Matt care at all?

Maybe it’s the fact that he’s actually managing to do something by himself for once, and doing it _right_. If he fails now, his father might not say so, but he’ll add it to a collective list of all the other times Matt couldn’t handle something or manage to fend for himself. His dad was right- God wants him to do this. He must be challenging him, testing his strength and the integrity of his moral compass. Matt doesn’t ever want to let anyone down.

“Look, I know this is boring, okay? And I know you’re used to doing things how you want to do them, but haven’t you ever wanted to try something new?”

Matt gapes for a moment next, taken aback and stumped on how to word a response, because Ryan’s just monotonously asked back, “Haven’t you?” And it’s strange, because _sure_ he’s wanted to change his lifestyle a little, and _maybe_ he’s thought just a little of breaking out of the bubble his family always ties him up in- but he didn’t exactly picture doing any of that with a stranger, especially one this rebellious. And mean.

Ryan begins to grin, though it's closer to a grimace, and Matt thinks it’s the first time in the few short days he’s been acquainted with him that he’s seen Ryan look anything other than pissed. 

“Look, if you really want me to keep hanging around you like this, praying and planting pretty flowers isn’t gonna cut it for me.” 

Matt wants to protest that he doesn’t want to just _hang around_ Ryan, as if they’re friends or something, but Ryan continues before he can get a word out.

“How about from now on, we do things _I_ want to do, and you’ll run home and tell the pastor that I’m really shaping up. He’ll tell Falcone, I’ll get my charges wiped, and by the end of the summer we’ll never have to talk to each other again. That sound good?”

No, it doesn’t, Matt wants to say, because that would be _lying_ , breaking a commandment as well as probably breaking a few laws along the way with whatever activities Ryan had in store. In that moment though, for once, Matt finds that he’s thinking less; less of everybody else, less of the church, less of God’s inevitable plan to leave him behind during the rapture. Maybe this is his opportunity to go out and do something more exciting than memorizing bible verses all summer. If he’s sinned so much in his past already, what _really_ are a couple more wrongdoings right now?

Hesitant and sheepish, Matt’s words come out with a mix of apprehension and eagerness as he questions, “What did you have in mind?”

And as it turns out, Ryan doesn’t have a very expansive list of leisure activities he keeps up with. As far as Matt’s seen, his hobbies include kicking over trash cans, spray painting curse words, and going places he’s not supposed to be. Just as he’s doing right now, in some abandoned and overgrown house with the windows shattered and beer cans strewn in what used to be the front yard. Matt’s surprised he’s even allowed himself to follow Ryan this far already- but it’s trespassing, or whatever this technically counts as, where Matt is choosing to draw the line. 

The way Ryan just nonchalantly waltzes in causes Matt to believe he probably comes here a lot, though he doesn’t know why anyone would favor a dusty and decrepit old house to their actual, at least slightly more liveable, one.

“Remind me what you’re doing here, again?” Matt calls to Ryan from outside, glancing at all the litter that surrounds him with knitted brows. The place is nestled back in some neglected development further into the back streets of town, and while Matt is really trying his best not to judge all of the potholes and barred-over windows they’d passed on the way, he’s growing more and more uneasy with being in such an unfamiliar and unfriendly place by the second.

“This is just where I go to hang out sometimes. No one ever comes here and it’s far enough from the main roads that it’s quiet even in the middle of the day.” Ryan calls back, voice a little muffled and echoey. Unsurprisingly, his words don’t really ease Matt’s fretting one bit. 

From somewhere inside the small building, Ryan groans at the momentary silence and says, “You know, you could quit being so scared of everything and just go inside.” And while Matt has never been one to give into peer pressure, there’s something in Ryan’s gruffly fearless attitude that makes Matt want to shove away his own fears for just a little while and prove Ryan, and himself, wrong.

Carefully, Matt takes the steps to venture into the house, cautious to avoid the shattered glass that crudely decorates the weed-ridden lawn. The smell of must and mold wafts over him as he makes it inside, and he takes in his surroundings with a stagnant perturbed feeling in his stomach, but with an additional and undeniable piqued sense of curiosity. There’s not much to the decor inside, if it can even qualify as that. Three ripped and dusty couches are angled in an awkward semi-circle in the middle of the floor, and the rest of the one-room building is mostly empty, save for the random busted bookshelf and other stray bits of debris that may have used to be furniture. Once-hung curtains lay frayed on the ground, and there are faded outlines of what must have been picture frames hung on the walls, though there aren’t any pictures around to be found.

Despite his initial distaste towards the house, the more Matt stands around to uncomfortably take in his surroundings, the more he begins to understand why someone might want to catch a quiet moment within its walls. It _is_ rather serene, with the distant sound of birds warbling to each other in the trees and no one around to tell anybody what to do. Matt thinks that must be why Ryan _really_ enjoys it; there’s no one here that looks at him as solely the town delinquent, no one to eye him down like he’s surely done something wrong. Briefly Matt wonders just how much time Ryan spends by himself, and if he ever gets lonely.

“So,” Ryan’s voice startles Matt from his thoughts with a small jump, “Thoughts?”

“It’s uh… Nice.” Matt chooses his words carefully, afraid of offending Ryan and landing himself in a spot of sudden trouble. 

“You don’t have to pretend it’s not a shit hole, I know it is. It’s not like I own this place or anything. I just thought of where I usually go when I’m alone, and this is it. I’ve never brought anyone here before, though.”

Matt feels an odd little spark of curiosity and delight at the idea of Ryan trusting him with a secret hideout. He isn’t sure what he’s done to deserve it, but is glad nonetheless that they seem to be inching towards a mutual friendliness. 

“Th-Thank you.”

Ryan shrugs apathetically. “Yeah, whatever. Don’t get used to it. You’re not really gonna be invited back.” And just like that, whatever progress Matt imagined he and Ryan were making is slipped out from under him, as though it weren’t ever there in the first place. Ryan moves to one of the rugged sofas, feet dragging, and plunks down on top of it, leaning back and stretching across its length with his eyes closed shut. Anxiety creeps in as Matt begins to wonder why he’s been brought here, what Ryan’s plan really was. Is he meant to just stand around and watch him lounge around for the rest of the day?

“Are you- are you really just going to lay there and do nothing?”

“No,” Ryan responds lazily, eyes still closed, “I’m going to lay here and _nap_.”

“Well…” Matt begins, but he’s not sure what he thought he could say to make the situation much better. It’s hot and stuffy in the abandoned house, and, as nice as it is, he’d really rather be doing something different. Something productive.

“Why don’t we, like… um, we could get to know each other a little?” He suggests, wincing as he awaits Ryan’s reply. He _knows_ he sounds like a child, so small and unsure of himself, hoping to make friends at summer camp, but it’s a reasonable idea, he thinks. If they’re really going to be spending all this time together in a reluctant symbiotic partnership, the least they could do is advance from merely uncomfortable acquaintances to maybe even unlikely friends. Some pretty dubious wishful thinking, Matt knows, but it doesn’t hurt to at least try it out and see where things go from there.

Still reclined on the couch, Ryan speaks up again after a few seconds of indefinite and awkward silence following Matt’s proposal, “What, you want to play twenty questions like this is some shitty slumber party?”

“Well, no, _not_ like a slumber party, but I don’t know, a way to learn more about each other or… something?” When Ryan puts it like that, Matt feels stupid for trying, but he chooses to passively stand his ground instead of immediately caving to Ryan’s rudeness. The tone and the words Ryan uses with him continue to make him feel inferior and small, but for the time being, there doesn’t seem to be a way around that, and he’s just going to have to deal with it. It’s not as though he’s used to feeling all that different.

Ryan groans, and his eyes finally open so that he sits up to stare at Matt with an uninterested and tired gaze. He seems to at least be considering the idea, or has maybe just realized that he won’t be able to get much sleep with Matt around pestering him. 

Finally, after an eternity, he begrudgingly sighs out a, “Fine,” and looks to Matt expectantly, waiting to begin with whatever childish game he managed to get unenthusiastically roped into playing. Matt looks around for somewhere to sit and get comfortable, and settles on a rather rusted and frail looking lawn chair that must be years old. It wouldn’t particularly be his first choice, but the only other options are the mold-ridden couches that are a little too close to Ryan for Matt’s liking, or the dirt-caked floor, so he takes the chance and winces as the busted thing heaves under his light weight.

“So, um, how long have you lived in Glendale?” Matt feels uneasy as he begins, but still looks to Ryan with a small and awkward smile, hopeful for an answer devoid of a negative attitude. Ryan emits another sigh, as though he can’t be bothered to answer even though they’ve only just begun, and for a moment Matt really thinks that it’s hopeless. He’s never going to get anywhere with him. 

Matt is fortunately proven wrong, however, when Ryan responds in the most decent manner he has all day.

“I grew up here. So, all my life.” Ryan’s voice is gruffly monotone and plainly disinterested, but Matt’s just spurred on by the fact that he’s actually willing to comply, no matter how short or reluctant his answers may be.

“Do you have any friends that live around here?” Matt asks next, eager to jump in, though the feeling doesn’t seem to be mutual. Regardless, and miraculously enough, Ryan responds again, his detachment from the subject so clearly evident in his voice but still not quite strong enough to deter Matt’s avid will.

“Nah,” He states simply, shaking his head, “I guess I used to have a group of guys that I’d always hang around, but that was more in my high school days. After I came back from college they were mostly all gone, off doing their own thing.” Ryan’s brow remains heavily set, though he seems momentarily remorseful. The moment is gone just as quickly as it came, however, when he rolls his eyes and shifts a little on the couch, muttering, “Whatever. They were all shitheads anyway.” 

Matt thinks he should try and sympathize with an apology, but he doesn’t expect Ryan to react well to pity. Instead, he asks, “You went to college?” And he’s just barely unable to mask the slight disbelief in his voice.

“What, is that hard for you to believe? You think I’m too stupid to go to school?” 

Warning bells go off in Matt’s head and he frantically begins to deny the accusations and apologize for his insinuation. However, Ryan cuts him off before he can manage to get a word out. 

“I don’t care, you’re not far off, anyway. I tried out a semester at a community college, and quit before they could kick me out for failing.”

“Haven’t you wanted to go back at all?”

“Hell no. I have a job, and a place to live; that’s enough for me. I’m fine without paying people to tell me I’m an idiot.”

While he knows it isn’t his place to judge Ryan’s life with such a limited perspective, Matt still can’t help but wonder if Ryan really is as content as he makes himself out to be. He mentioned all his friends moved away, and most of his free time seems to be spent doing things he’s not supposed to do. If he’s reading into things correctly, it seems as though Ryan’s really unhappier than he’s leading on. But, it’s still not in Matt’s best interest to try and provide any insight or advice, and he knows that. So he doesn’t say any of what he’s thinking.

“So, where do you work?” He asks, genuinely curious at this point more than willing to fill the void the silence and discomfort leaves between them. 

“You’re just full of questions, aren’t you?” Ryan asks, though it seems to have been rhetorical as he goes on to say, “There's a tobacco shop near to my house. I usually work the morning shift there every day except Saturday.”

“So Saturdays are when you’ll go out and vandalize church buildings?” Matt asks passive-aggressively, an uncharacteristic burst of confidence freeing the question from his mind before he can even think twice about the potential consequences. He’s really not one to be so rude, and doesn’t consider himself particularly judgemental, but Ryan has hardly given any reason for Matt not to see the worst in him.

Ryan sits up then, the worn couch creaking a little as he shifts, and Matt instantly draws back, subconsciously hunching his shoulders in as if to possibly shrink away into his frail little lawn chair. Ryan doesn’t say anything for a moment, just holds his gaze pointed on Matt so that he can practically feel it, even though he’s not looking back. Matt’s mind quickly begins to reel, and he’s in the middle of planning how to make his hasty escape when Ryan sprouts the smuggest of grins, pulls out a pack of cigarettes to light one up, and eventually huffs a stream of smoke out of his nose in a quiet laugh.

Shaking his head a little and with his grin still held, he mutters, “You’ve got some nerve for a church boy,” and Matt’s mouth is open with the beginnings of an apology when Ryan continues, “It took you long enough. I didn’t think you had it in you.”

Matt rolls his eyes irritatedly, as if trying to pretend he hadn’t actually been momentarily _afraid_ , though lets out the nervous breath he’d been holding in slowly. 

“Why do you smoke?” He then feels compelled to ask as the strong smell drifts over to him and mingles unpleasantly with the mold and mildew. The grimace on his face isn’t very well-concealed.

“I don’t have to answer to you,” Ryan says, a quick defiant reflex that Matt figures must be well practiced, but he next leans forward so that his elbows rest on his knees, takes a drag, and answers anyway, “But it’s relaxing. It’s a habit, but it calms me down.”

“So… all you do is go to work, smoke, and sleep? Don’t you do anything else in your free time? Well, I guess besides crime and stuff-,”

Ryan’s eyes narrow into a glare, interrupting in a voice that’s ugly and brash, “Don’t you ever know when to shut up?”

“I’m just _asking_. You don’t have to be so mean.”

“Yeah, and I’m just telling you to shut up. Why are you so nosey, anyway? We’re not going to be friends.”

“W-Well don’t flatter yourself, I don’t want to be friends anyway. It’s not like I chose to be here.”

“Oh of course, how could I forget? You’re just here because God told you this was your calling, right?”

“Why are you such a _jerk?_ ” Matt feels his temper slipping out from underneath him in a way that it never has before. His voice is rising and his face is growing hot with the simmering of his blood.

“Why do you do always do what your dad says?” Ryan retorts, all dark eyes and static frown.

Matt sighs frustratedly at that, slumping back in the rattled lawn chair despite himself, despite the urge to argue back still dwelling and rolling warm in his chest. He retreats because he knows he doesn’t have an answer, or at least not a _good_ answer, one that’s reasonable and is anything other than, “Because he’s my father and that’s just what I do.” 

He also doesn’t have anything nice to say back to Ryan, and though it’s increasingly infuriating to be insulted by some half-wit dirtbag, Matt was taught that if he doesn’t have anything nice to say, then he shouldn’t say anything at all. So he looks anywhere but at Ryan and lets himself cool down quietly in the particularly tense silence that ensues. Part of him, the majority of him, wants to immediately say that he’s sorry for the outburst, to tell Ryan that he doesn’t know what came over him. But when he does finally shift his gaze over to the other boy again, he’s looking back with his hard eyes and this impudent smirk, all arrogant as if he’s so sure that he’s won.

This really wasn’t how Matt wanted his afternoon to pan out.

“Okay,” Matt finally breaks, demoralized and irritated, “I’m leaving.” And he’s just made it back onto the overgrown grass outside when he hears Ryan call out from the couch behind him, “Make sure to let the door hit you on the way out.”


	2. Jumpsuit Gem

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> yay, update!
> 
> this chapter is a little shorter, but all the rest are right about at 8k. i hope that suffices :o)

Church has always felt right to Matt. Maybe he’s never cared all too much for the droning hymns or the uncomfortable pews, but the ins and outs are comfortable in their own way. It’s a routine, it’s regulation- there’s a list of 10 things Matt shouldn’t do, and he doesn’t do them. The serene atmosphere of the church always allows his head to mellow out for a bit, with its stained glass windows and undusted statuettes. The rather temporary inner peace is such a welcome change that finds he hardly minds the scrutiny of the church if it means he can rest easy for just a little while. 

And ironically enough, the monotonous Sunday ritual is often one of the only times Matt is able to avoid the lectures of his father and shake the feeling of God’s judgmental stare. Aside from the strong scent of old women’s perfume and the stale crackers at communion, Matt enjoys attending church, able to bask in the conformity and familiarity of it all if he can’t appreciate much else.

After a routine albeit mundane morning service come Sunday, Matt is feeling relaxed and in his element. After he’s given his polite goodbyes to all of the regular members, having endured an entire five minutes of old Martha Sinclair’s ramblings, Matt sets about tidying up the now empty sanctuary. He’s in the middle of collecting scattered stray bulletins when a familiar voice reaches his ears.

“Matthew!” It rings, pleasant and bright, “I haven’t seen you in a bit!” Chris’s voice echoes from across the sanctuary, and Matt turns around to see his former Sunday school teacher approaching him with outstretched arms. The warm smile on his face causes Matt to break into a grin as well, and he decides he can take a moment from cleaning to accept the hug.

“Hey, how have you been?” Matt asks, words flowing with simple ease. Chris has always been more of a friend to him than anything else. He was down to earth and far less preachy with his… well, with his preaching. Matt found his easy-going attitude to be a refreshing take on religion, something much easier to swallow than his father’s scolding and threats of God’s almighty wrath. That’s why he was so disappointed when he learned that Chris was taking off to go to grad school out of state, knowing that the one person who seemed to at least sort of understand him wouldn’t be around for a while. He’d completely forgotten that meant that Chris would be back for the summers, though.

“I’ve been pretty good, school is tough, but… it’s good. Let’s not talk about me, though, what’s this I hear about you hanging out with that guy Ryan?”

And Matt freezes up then, wondering if and how it’s really spread that fast that he’s been spotted around town with his near polar opposite. It's not _embarrassing_ , per se, but he still feels like he doesn't want people knowing. It's not as though he has much of a reputation to ruin, either, or anyone to impress. It was ultimately his father that put him up to this, and God himself should know that it’s a good deed, not some attempt at rebellion. Still, though, it makes Matt feel strangely uneasy to have someone else know what he’s been up to- spending time around a cursing, angry boy that breaks things and smells like cigarette smoke.

He tries to recover from being momentarily flustered, and manages to fumble out an awkward, “Wh-What?”

“Your dad told me about how you’ve started supervising community service. He really roped you into that one, huh?”

“Oh, yeah, uh…” Matt scrambles for a reply, but fortunately doesn’t remain caught off guard for very long. “I mean, it’s not like I _want_ to be doing this stuff, you know? But I guess there’s not much to do around here anyway.” Matt smiles tensely, small and a bit unsure. Something about not seeing Chris for a little while makes it suddenly a bit harder to talk to him than any time before.

Chris shakes his head, and leans in a little closer to his friend as he says, “Seriously, though, don’t cross him, alright? Just do whatever you were told to do and don’t stick around after that. He’s not worth the bother of trying to shoo him in the right direction. He’s got this bad temper, apparently- my friend and I were at a bar late one night and he got totally hammered and tried to fight the friend I was with. He got a few good punches in before the staff threw him out.” Chris punctuates his aggravation at the memory with a roll of his eyes, and Matt tries not to let the sudden fear he’s feeling shine through in his expression. It doesn’t really work, though, and Chris tries reassuring him in that soothing Sunday school tone, light and acutely sweet.

“It’s alright, it’s not like he’s a wild animal- even if he might sometimes act like one. All I’m saying is that he needs Christ more than most people I’ve met, but he’s never going to be willing to listen. Just don’t waste your time, alright? He’s just… he’s not a good guy. And get out of there once the summer’s over. You’re a real good kid and I’d hate to see you get along with the wrong kind of people.” Chris puts a hand on Matt’s shoulder and seems to be searching his face for a signal of agreeance. Although he remains unsettled and bewildered, Matt manages to offer a small nod to show that he’s listening before Chris takes his hand away.

And just like that, his former teacher mentions something about needing to head out for some errand he needs to run, and they exchange somewhat hasty goodbyes before Chris is travelling back out of the sanctuary doors and Matt is standing between the front pews again with a handful of bulletins and a newly heavy feeling in his stomach. Sure, he considered and maybe even expected for Ryan to have a bad history, and has witnessed countless examples of his bad attitude. But blind and abrupt violence isn’t something that Matt feels he can so easily brush away. He doesn’t think mentioning it to Ryan during their next “service session” will result in anything but disaster, though; he imagines it might just hurt his feelings, or worse, kick up his hot temper that’s allegedly brewing inside. 

Matt can’t do much more with the unsettling information other than to opt into heeding Chris’s words and decide to tread even lighter around Ryan than he already had been. It’s assuming the worst, but if it helps him actively avoid whatever anger issues Ryan may or may not have, Matt’s more than willing to give it a go. He gulps down his nerves, and sort of starts to wish that Chris hadn’t mentioned it to him at all.

\--

Things seem to be back to normal when Matt meets up with Ryan on Saturday - or at least as normal as they can seem in the ever strange situation - and for that, he’s thankful. He’s mostly surprised, and stupidly thankful, that Ryan even turned up at all, what with the altercation the other day. Regardless of whatever rude things they said to one another, it seems that it’s all been left behind, no residual sour feelings or lingering grudges to be found. Matt prays a quick thanks for God for that, for his mercy in such a new and intimidating situation. He’s sure that the last thing he’d need is for Ryan to mark him as an enemy, especially when they’ve only just met, and when there are a supposedly lot more hours for them to reluctantly share ahead.

Sure, Matt knows that at any given moment he could march straight over to the police department and have them take Ryan off his hands, but he wants to at least give him the benefit of the doubt. His mother always tells him that being a Christian is about seeing the good in people, and forgiving them when they do wrong. 

Maybe it all won’t really be as bad as it seems, and maybe, miraculously, he’ll even gain something from it, something more than the pastor’s faint and terse approval. What he could possibly gain from someone like Ryan, Matt has no idea, and just in case it all doesn’t play out as well as he’s hoping, Matt keeps in mind his plan B: the option to run back home to father looming as a constant safety net.

Today, though, Matt won’t have anywhere to run back to or retreat from. Because he’s taking Ryan into the church with him.

“You’re kidding.” Ryan deadpans, less of a question and more of a statement that has to be true, that he really seems to _hope_ is true.

With a shake of his head, Matt shrugs and responds, “No, I’m not. There’s this monthly pancake breakfast thing that we do for the seniors, and… I don't know, I just thought instead of heading off somewhere we could just do some service right here?” He can't help the way it all comes out as an uneasy question, all unsure and full of trepidation. 

And honestly, he expects Ryan to just turn right back around and head home, or to start yet another argument with Matt, to just do _something_. Something other than asking, in that signature impassive voice of his that, now, surprisingly sounds like he might care a little, though he’s really trying not to, “Won’t I scare all the old people away?” 

After a quick once over of Ryan’s appearance - uncombed hair, dark bags, and matching dark clothes that contrast starkly to Matt’s own dress shirt and slacks - Matt is all too tempted to tell him yes, he just might, and that Ryan should just forget about it for the sake of the elderly. But it wouldn’t be the Christian thing to do, and really, Ryan doesn’t look as scary as he thinks, or maybe hopes, that he does.

Whether it be an actual concern or a poor attempt at a cop out, Matt dismisses Ryan anyway, and tells him that the church accepts everyone, regardless of what they look like. He decides to take the groan his statement elicits from Ryan as his reluctant compliance, and doesn't bother contemplating why exactly Ryan isn't choosing to roll his eyes and stomp away with a scoff. Maybe he has an unexpected soft side for the old and frail, or maybe, and more likely, he’s just aware of the fact that Matt is in his home territory, and could easily call out for his dad and cause him more trouble than ditching is probably worth. 

Maybe, though, it's best if Matt just stays in his lane and doesn't waste his time trying to figure Ryan out, because he’s got a strong feeling that he just might never be able to.

Inside, the sanctuary has been made into a makeshift dining hall, with round folding tables filled with familiar faces of the church. Ryan is silent and seems to be taking it all in, leaving Matt to wonder if it’s his first time ever stepping foot in a church at all. In the middle of his pondering, however, a little lost in his thoughts, Matt manages to accidentally catch the eye of sweet old Martha sitting at a nearby table, who notices him and almost immediately begins to make slow and steady headway towards him from across the room.

He cares about the church, and he hates to be rude to anyone, but of all people Matt wants to spend thirty uncomfortable and most likely unbreakable minutes speaking with, the ever-babbling Martha Sinclair is admittedly very far down on the list. It’s an awful thought to imagine her asking about Ryan, about how long they’ve been friends - and they're not friends, they're _not_ , but it’s not like he can _tell_ her that - and having to just painfully endure the encounter until she finds someone else to bother, or has to take her medication. Whichever comes sooner.

Hurriedly, Matt turns to head the opposite direction, hoping to make a break for it before Martha can weave her way between the tables with her walker. In his hopefully inconspicuous haste, however, Matt manages to bump into someone else, instead.

“I-I’m so sorry!” He stutters out, hoping he hasn’t just knocked a senior citizen to the floor. Momentary relief finds him as Matt regains focus and notices that it’s not an impaired elder, but Chris, his shining eyes and pleasant smile as friendly as always. It strikes him not too soon after, though, that Ryan is there with him, and he prays for a brief moment that Chris won’t be too upset at his bringing a delinquent into their place of worship. It seems as though Matt is always afraid of being in trouble with someone for doing the wrong thing.

“Hello Matt, and, Ryan, is it?” Chris greets them both, amiability unfaltering. Matt glances over to the Ryan beside him, who’s surprisingly kept up during his getaway, and notices the slight grimace he's wearing. Matt's not sure he’s ever _not_ grimacing, though, so he doesn't think much of it.

“Uh, yeah. Hey.” Ryan responds, eyes averted as he remains closed off and cold. Chris doesn't seem to mind, though. If anything, Matt reasons, he probably expects it from someone like him.

“I heard you’ve been spending some time with Matt recently. You aren’t corrupting him, are you?” Chris asks, and smiles like it’s a joke, like it wasn’t supposed to hurt at all. And maybe it wasn’t, maybe Matt’s reading it all wrong; but if the way Chris last talked about Ryan is anything to base his emotions off of, noting how he wasn’t worth anyone’s time, Matt thinks that he has at least got somewhat of a right idea of how Chris really feels about Ryan.

Ryan scowls back at Chris, but doesn’t verbally answer, doesn’t seem to want to give him the satisfaction.

It’s moments before anyone says anything more, and quickly Matt decides that if he doesn’t jump in, something, or someone, is going to give. He takes it upon himself to break up the odd little stare-down the two seem to be caught up in.

“I think he’s still warming up to me.” Matt relays jokingly, his short and forced laughter coming out just as uncomfortably as his words. As if Ryan could ever warm up to him, could ever fully stand to be around someone so pure and full of will to do the right thing. Oh well, Chris doesn’t need to know that.

Chris lets out an easy-going laugh in return, and it’s the kind of laugh that parents use when talking about their children with other parents. That helpless, “Kids will be kids!” chuckle of affirmation. Matt can’t help but think it sounds a little condescending, but doesn’t manage to voice his thoughts.

“Well, don’t warm up to him too much, he’s got to keep his focus on the church.” Chris continues smiling, eyes glinting, “I’m sure he’s got better places to be and better people to spend his time with, anyway.”

“Fuck you,” Ryan interjects, quiet yet bold, and suddenly seething. Matt looks over to him in surprise to see that his eyes are narrowed in aggravation, pointed all sharp and unfaltering directly at Chris, as if his gaze alone could do something to him.

“Don’t act like you know anything about me just because you-,”

“I just want what’s best for Matt- and for you, believe it or not.” Chris counters before Ryan can finish, and raises a hand to grip firmly onto his shoulder as he says, “I believe God has a plan for everyone.”

With a signature scoff and an anger that’s quickly bubbling to the surface, Ryan shakes free of Chris’s grasp, and turns to head back towards the entrance to the building, fuming. Matt stares after him in stunned silence, before looking around to notice that none of those nearby to them even seem aware that anything out of the ordinary has taken place. He’s thankful for that, at least, but still can’t help but feel guilty for bringing Ryan here for the mild catastrophe to strike in the first place. All the while, there are parts of him that are caught between two sides, foolishly wanting to follow after Ryan to possibly mitigate the situation, but simultaneously feeling much too ill-informed and cowardly to make the move to chase him. 

It’s really not his business what upsets Ryan, anyway, and not in his best interest to bother finding out. This barely diffused disaster has shed some light on the stupidity of his decisions, if anything- it’s as good a sign as any to him that this whole business of coaxing Ryan into doing good deeds, or whatever it was that he’d gotten himself into, is really not worth the risk of trying. He’s just started his feat of contemplating how to best tell his father while avoiding all blame when Chris interrupts his thoughts with a hand on his arm.

“Don’t be upset with yourself, I told you that he wasn’t worth the trouble.” He tells Matt gently, and though it makes Matt feel a little better, he also feels an unplaceable pang of hurt, a blurred and wavering emotion that’s gone before he can really question it. Maybe it’s the despair of failure.

“I can’t stand to see him go like that, though, you know? I’m going to see if I can calm him down at all, in case he causes more... _trouble_ , in his anger. You stay here and help out with the breakfast, alright? I’ll be back soon.” It all comes so quickly that Matt can barely utter an uneasy, “Okay,” before Chris is turning to follow after Ryan’s trail of vexation.

It’s hard for Matt not to worry for Chris’s safety after that- wasn’t Chris the one who warned Matt of Ryan in the first place, who told him to keep his distance? He can’t imagine _why_ Chris would be so willing to go after someone so bitter and cynical, but he figures it’s something to do with having a bigger heart and greater faith than Matt. In the middle staring after Chris’s own departure, wondering how he got to be so amiable and well-rounded, and why he himself can’t be more like him, Matt hears his name called from somewhere behind him. And for once, he openly welcomes Martha’s ramblings to help take his mind off of the minor calamity he’d stupidly managed to cause.

The morning flies by after that, and soon enough, after being caught up in serving up mediocre pancakes and humoring the old folks with their stories, the flow of incoming seniors slows to an eventual stop. He’s already graciously aided the kitchen volunteers in cleaning up and reset all the pews before he even becomes aware that he hasn’t seen Chris come back at all yet. It’s an unnerving realization, to say the least, but the last thing he wants to do is throw himself into another daunting situation by venturing out to find him. Tomorrow is Sunday, and he knows that Chris seldom misses a service; he’ll see him then, and will make it a point to ask about his daring endeavor.

\--

 _Why_ \- It’s all Matt can think to himself as he traverses down some road that’s all cracked pavement and scattered cigarette butts. Why is he doing this? Why doesn’t he get it through his stupid, naive brain that none of this effort is worth it? Ultimately, Matt doesn't know why, and figures he might not ever know what exactly has compelled him to venture all the way to Ryan’s house to track him down. All he knows is that Ryan left him waiting outside the church for over thirty minutes that Wednesday afternoon, and he wants to find out the reason why.

None of the street names stick out in his mind at all, but Matt nervously turns the corners he thinks that he remembers in hopes that he’s heading the right way. What is he even supposed to say to him, when he abruptly shows up at Ryan’s home to invade his privacy and annoy him with his presence? Quite honestly, Matt hasn't thought that far ahead, and every time he starts to, he becomes too anxious to bother figuring anything out. 

He’ll see when he gets there. He’ll wing it. He’ll probably say something pathetically hopeful and far from intimidating. He’ll probably make Ryan angry with his persistence and ruin yet another task he wasn’t equipped to handle. He’ll make a mess of things.

But he won't really know for sure until he arrives. So for now, he just keeps his head low and frets as he walks on.

The small buildings that line that street all look slightly similar, enough so that Matt furrows his eyebrows as he scans all the matching cracked porches and peeling paint in search of something familiar. He’s so close to rendering the effort hopeless, nagging thoughts creeping up on him again as they continue to question, “ _Why?_ ”, before he spots something. It makes his stomach twist oddly to know that he's successfully found the last person who wants to see him, but simultaneously triumphant that's he's accomplished his feat. 

Matt moves up the walkway and continues to eye the torn and frayed black cap that lays in what’s meant to be Ryan’s front lawn, but doesn't bother trying to ration why it might be lying in the wet grass. It's Ryan's, that's all he needs to know; well, that, and what sorry excuse he’ll hastily serve up to Ryan after he knocks on the door.

His hand hovers hesitantly above the front door for a moment as he stands on the crumbling concrete steps that he's still not sure are safe. It's probably best for him to just get out of here now, he thinks, in case Ryan is in one of those infamous bad moods of his. Like he tends to be. Like he _always_ is. Matt hates to imagine the potential scenario that may ensue- smiling awkwardly, crossing a line by asking Ryan where he’s been, being told it's not his business, probably getting cursed at, and maybe even walking home with a busted lip. 

This was stupid, Matt quickly reasons, wondering why, why, _why_ he thought this was a plausible plan, why he acts on such idiotic impulses, why he can’t ever leave a situation behind him with apathy like-

The door is flung open, and Matt’s so startled by the action, so surprised and suddenly a little scared, that he misplaces his footing and almost falls from the step. Almost. Once he's barely regained his balance, though, he's nearly loses it again. Because venturing out of Ryan’s place, grazing past Matt’s small frame with angry determination, is none other than Chris. Immediately, Matt turns to follow him, begins to try and understand what in the world could be happening.

“Chris? Wh-What are you-,” Matt begins, but stops short as Chris turns around to face him, gasps, follows the blood that drips from Chris’s upper lip down to the pavement below.

Agitated, Chris uses the back of his hand to wipe at his swelling nose, and Matt winces at how rough the movement is. “Don't even fucking bother with him,” Chris advises Matt, jutting his chin in the direction of the front door crossly. There’s such a foreign heat to the way that Chris spits his words that Matt feels suddenly bewildered, facing someone so angry that he almost seems akin to a stranger. And then Chris says something more, something that nearly makes Matt entirely sure that this can’t be the same Sunday school teacher that used to smile at him and offer him doughnuts in the early, pleasant mornings. 

“He’s just as fucked up as the first time I dumped him.” 

Chris rolls his eyes, and then he’s turning on his heel, shaking his head, and walking away. Too soon, Matt thinks- before Matt can ask what the hell he’s talking about, before Matt can fully register the meaning of his words or the small blood spatter on the ground. 

"What are you even _talking_ about?" Matt calls after him, bewildered and unbelievably confused. Chris is already halfway down the street, though, and doesn't make any move to turn around to Matt or even throw a frustrated response over his shoulder. Matt learned on Saturday at the breakfast that chasing after angry people isn't ever going to be something that's high on his list of priorities, and considers this situation to be no exception to that. So he's left standing there dumbly, mouth hanging open and eyebrows drawn together, realizing that there’s really only one other option. One other person that might be of some use to Matt- that is, if he's willing to cooperate.

It digs into him, unable to be avoided - the uneasy notion that Matt’s walking into a near stranger’s house, plainly and irritated and uninvited - but he shakes it off. Chris left the door wide open in his wake, and Matt finds Ryan easily after slipping into the small space, facing away from him, leaning hunched over on a counter in the middle of where the kitchen and shabby living room seem to meet. It's not like Matt to confront someone, or anyone, for that matter- he can't actually think of any example at all where it's happened before, let alone when he's been in a situation that he needs to. But Chris is his friend, and if he can't stand up for those that he cares about, then what good is he to anyone, really?

“Hey,” Matt states, less of a greeting and more a way to gain Ryan’s attention. The word isn't as stern as he may have wanted it to be, but it gets the job done as Ryan glances over his shoulder at him.

“What the hell did you do to Chris?” He demands to know, the curse word slipping out beyond Matt’s own accord. Normally, he'd flinch, but for now he stands his ground in the unfamiliar place that smells of cigarette smoke and mold and just stares. Just as he thinks he's got Ryan's attention, though, the culprit turns away again.

With a slump of his shoulders, Ryan exasperates in a tired voice, “Get out of here. Stop trying to question things you don't understand.” There's a coldness to his words, colder than usual, and it makes Matt just about ready to heed his words, to leave before he digs too deep, to stop poking his head in everyone’s business, to never have to see Ryan again. But he remembers the anger with which Chris wiped at his nose and cursed Ryan’s name, and Matt doesn't think he can excuse Ryan’s attack on his friend without some sort of closure.

“I-I’m serious. Tell me what you did to him, you jerk.”

Suddenly, Ryan's turning full-body to face Matt, and there are tears welling in his eyes that definitely weren't there before. Abruptly, and in a tone that's equal parts obnoxious and upset, Ryan gives him the answers Matt’s not so sure he wants anymore.

“I fucked up, okay?” Ryan spits, bitter and angry despite the soft and vulnerable sadness in his eyes. “I fuck up everything I touch, and if you hang around me long enough you’re going to get fucked up too. So just leave.” A couple tears have fallen now, dripping down Ryan’s cheeks. He makes no move to wipe them away though, and averts his desolate eyes to train to the floor, away from Matt, away from everything. Whatever strength he seemed to have collected just vanishes as Ryan then all but crumples to the floor, defeated and emotional and weak. He rests his elbows on his knees and his head in his hands- surrendering.

Clouded with disbelief and startled into silence, Matt can’t manage anything good to respond with at all. He knows that he needs to just head right back out the front door that’s still hanging wide open, but his feet won’t move an inch.

After a few beats of silence, Ryan looks up again, his red-rimmed eyes meeting Matt’s with a painful pang to Matt’s heart. And as Matt takes a closer look, he can see his cheekbone is swollen pink, and there’s a split by his eyebrow. 

“What are you still doing here? Just _go_.” Ryan bites indignantly, and a bit quieter under his breath, Matt catches his followed mumble of, “Just leave like everyone else.” He thinks that may have been the part that he wasn’t supposed to hear.

The sudden and surprising rage that built in Matt as he watched Chris storm away begins to dissipate, and soon enough there’s nothing left of it. A dilemma has been sprung upon him, Matt soon realizes as he hesitates there, mind flickering back and forth between the door and the dangerous man crying on the ground. He doesn’t like Ryan’s attitude, or the things he does, or the curse words he says, or really anything about him. But Matt doesn’t think he can possibly find it in his heart to turn away from someone so clearly miserable and in need.

Cautiously, Matt advances, taking a few slow and deliberate steps before sitting down a safe couple of feet away from Ryan. Ryan’s slightly shaking hands that are curled into angry fists convey his irritability, but the tears that remain in his eyes and drying on his cheeks tell Matt that he’s not as tough as he always wants, or needs, to come across as. Gently, Matt restates his earlier request, now far less accusatory.

“Tell me what happened.”

Demoralized and strung out, Ryan rolls his eyes, looking up at the fluorescent kitchen light that casts a dim and unpleasant glow over the two of them as it flickers defiantly. He shakes his head, brings his hands up to his hair and tugs a little, looks anywhere but at Matt. It seems like he’s trying to decide if he should bother saying anything at all, before he exhales and seems to manage to quiet his inward plight for a little while longer.

“He left me. I let him do whatever he wanted to me because I’m so… God I’m so _weak_ for him, I missed him and I wanted him back, but I _knew_ it was a bad idea. I knew it.” Ryan talks with his hands, maintaining eye contact with the floor. It seems as though he’s talking to himself more than to Matt, maybe pretending Matt is someone he actually cares about, someone he wishes would still bother to listen to him.

“He always made me angrier than anybody else could, and when I get angry, I-I can’t always control myself. So I went off on him, but it…” Ryan falters, pausing for a moment to swallow words or feelings that get caught in his throat. He looks as though he’s getting worked up again just recounting the events that took place. 

“He said that he couldn’t stand to be around me, that I wasn’t worth the trouble. He left me, he left me _again_. All I ever do is ruin anything good that comes along, things are always gonna be shitty for me and I should just… I should fucking _know_ that by now.” Ryan grits his teeth, moving his hands to cover and scrub at his face, but not before Matt can witness a few more falling tears. And it still doesn’t shock him any less this time around to see someone so trained on being tough just crumpled by the weight of their own emotions.

His head is reeling, and with so much information and detail that still somehow feels like too little, Matt doesn’t know where to go from here. Ryan and Chris were a couple? Since when has Ryan even liked boys? Since when has _Chris_ , his own religious teacher, someone he thought he knew- since when has _he_ liked boys? Maybe, Matt thinks, a rational thought shining among a bewildered mess of others, that he shouldn’t try and figure it out all at once. Or at all, for that matter. If anything, he can tell that the last thing Ryan needs in such a state is a bombardment of questions. So he settles for trying to diffuse, rather than stir up, the storm.

Matt clears his throat. “Ryan,” He begins, voice sounding thick and the name oddly foreign, “If he was really that horrible to you… then it’s his loss. Anyone who says such mean things is- well, you’re better off without them.” As Ryan glances up at him, their eyes locking momentarily, Matt gets the feeling that his words aren’t doing much of anything to help. He’s out of his element here, trying to reason and communicate with someone who he bets wishes he wasn’t even there.

It surprises him, however, when Ryan actually responds with, a little shaky and reluctant and mumbled, “Thanks.”

But he soon shakes his head at himself again. “It just sucks, you know? Because, I _knew_ that everything between us was shit. He was… he took me for granted, he came back because he knew I wouldn’t say no when he asked to hook up. I’m such a coward for that- he has this power over me, where, he knows I’ll never break up with him or tell him no because I’m so fucking _pathetic_ and desperate not to be alone anymore.” Ryan sucks his teeth. In disbelief at himself, at the memory of Chris, or at something different- Matt has no idea.

Biting and bitter, Ryan goes on just when Matt thinks he won’t say another word. “But it was all for nothing, because he still thinks I’m worthless and he left me to be alone all over again.” Ryan sniffs, and presses his fingers at his screwed shut eyes. 

Matt still can’t figure out what it is that compels him to act so boldly around Ryan, to say and do things that he wouldn’t imagine doing at church or at home. But he thinks that at this point, the “Why” of it all that he’s been relentlessly chasing couldn’t be more irrelevant now, or any further out of his own reach.

“You’re not alone,” Matt says, but feels the small amount of confidence he’d gathered begin to drain away. The rest comes out in an embarrassed and fleeting rush. 

“I-I know I might not be your favorite person to be around, but I don’t think you deserve to be upset. You can say no if you want, but I, um… I’ll be your friend, you know. So you don’t have to be by yourself, if you don’t want to.” He dares another peek up at Ryan’s features, expecting to see his token angry eyebrows, or a scowl of any sort. Those sad eyes of his aren’t as dark as they usually are, though, and as they train on Matt, Matt thinks Ryan might even look a little relieved.

Rubbing at his eyes some more and shrugging his shoulders, Ryan gives Matt a simple answer that’s mostly neutral and monotonous, but still conveys the right amount of emotion that it needs to. 

“Sure, why not?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thoughts? feelings? i respond to every comment, if that, for some reason, gives you more of an incentive to let me know what you think!


	3. Fuel

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this chapter is one of my favorites, i think.
> 
> if you were wondering what specific type of christian matt is, good question..... for the sake of the progression of the story (and because there's so many nitty gritty details involved with each one that i could never get right) he's just sort of a mix of all of them. catholic, methodist, baptist, you name it. religion has a lot of rules but this is my fic and i'm making my own rules! cool!
> 
> in this chapter the boys go to a bridge over a river! [these](https://prairierivers.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/image1-768x564.jpeg) [two](https://chicagotonight.wttw.com/sites/default/files/field/image/Chicago%20River_0.jpg) pictures of the chicago river are basically what i had in mind, if that helps you get some nice visuals going on while you read
> 
> ALSO i made up some very basic lil maps of places in the fic so you can see my **writer's vision** i'll link them at the beginning of every chapter from now on, just for fun! pls enjoy my ms paint masterpieces
> 
> [ryan's house](http://oi67.tinypic.com/261zpue.jpg)  
> [the church](http://oi66.tinypic.com/33vlunq.jpg)  
> [entire town map](http://oi64.tinypic.com/2nbx9qu.jpg)

Matt really should have expected that, along with offering his friendship to Ryan, he was also offering to put up with things that he might not necessarily like. It’s only been two weeks or so since their official agreement to spend more time with each other, but in a span of just over fourteen days Ryan has managed to make Matt uncomfortable an innumerable amount of times. Matt has a strong belief that he’s doing it all on purpose.

Like just the other day, when he watched in horror as Ryan casually swiped a pack of cigarettes from the tobacco shop where he works, Ryan solely shrugged in response to Matt’s disbelief and claimed that, “They owe me. Don’t pay me enough, anyway.” Matt wondered for a good few hours thereafter if God would consider him an accomplice in breaking a commandment for remaining silent.

Additionally, Matt has to put up with plumes of musty secondhand smoke, and Ryan sometimes smelling of the familiar scent of some of the pastor’s beers. Ryan has a habit of making rude remarks about Matt’s appearance, like how his hair is combed too perfectly into place, or how he always has the buttons on his shirt done all the way up. He has an attitude, doesn’t much listen to anything Matt says, and Matt has become accustomed to Ryan swearing. A lot.

But of all things, all that he was unaware of until he spent this much time around Ryan, Matt didn’t expect this. Matt didn’t think something like this, something equally as spontaneous as it is entirely _stupid_ , would be on Ryan’s list of conditions to their unconventional form of a friendship.

The train’s whistle blares for a fourth time, and an unplaceable anxiety wells in the pit of Matt’s stomach as he watches the wheels thunder over the tracks. He can feel the air the locomotive displaces brush past him, gentle gusts on his face, its speed and its force stirring his nerves even further. With a glance up at the gathering clouds in the sky, all dark and gloomy in their hovering, Matt wonders why he continues to willingly tag along with Ryan and agree to the things he suggests. Why he complies despite knowing better, why he keeps delving deeper into probable trouble, and why he feels weirdly, distantly, okay with the discomfort if he’s encouraged by the thrill of something new.

He really doesn’t want to ask again, but his mouth moves quicker than his better judgement can stop it.

“So, I just- remind me why we’re doing this, again?” Matt questions, looking at Ryan just in time to catch the way he shakes his head with a reluctant smirk.

“Yesterday you said you were bored, and you asked why I don’t ever do anything interesting. And I _tried_ to show you something fun-,”

“Again, trying to rope me into gambling is not _fun_ , Ryan.” Matt explains for what is now the third time. He watches his footing carefully as they cross to the other side of the tracks, the gates lifted to allow their entry now that the unsettlingly powerful train has finally passed.

“ _So_ ,” Ryan continues insistently, “That’s why we’re doing this. Because you said the church was stuffy since the AC broke, and you’re bored out of your mind doing nothing all day.”

Matt rolls his eyes, more anxiously exasperated than he should be in this moment, yet he can’t seem to talk himself out of it and shake the feeling away- as if he's ever been able to accomplish such a feat as leveling his own head.

“So you’re putting me in danger now to, what, get back at me for not understanding how to play poker?

“I don’t know if I’d call it getting back at you. I’m... _indulging_ you. I’d appreciate it while it lasts if I were you, because I’m not going to put up with your complaining much longer.”

Matt shuts up then, unsure of what he could say to help his case, or to persuade Ryan to stop his tries to peer pressure him into doing very stupid things. If he turns back now, he can evade a catastrophe before it strikes and devastates, Matt knows this- but his father won’t have left for his bible study group if he goes back home now, and he doesn’t exactly feel like catching up with him at the minute. Admittedly, though, trying to awkwardly explain to the pastor why he’s dripping wet when he comes home later might end up being even more of an insufferable endeavor.

Matt’s eyes wander up to the dark clouds yet again, and his stomach remains twisting in a way that tells him to turn back. Ryan is the most infuriatingly stubborn person Matt has met, though, so before even trying, he accepts that an attempt to talk his way out of this would only be a waste of breath. And he's avoiding all of his other options, avoiding his sensibility and the left half of his brain. It’s between Ryan and his father.

So it looks like he’s stuck.

“Alright,” Ryan says, and it’s then that Matt realizes that he’s stopped, that they’re there. It’s a public place, but Matt still feels like he’s somewhere he shouldn’t be allowed. He wonders if swimming in the river is even permitted, but the doubt fills his head and conquers just as quickly as the initial thought- the doubt that something like the law would ever hinder Ryan’s drive one bit.

And just one look over at Ryan has Matt feeling intimidated all over again. The other boy nods at the railing of the bridge they're on, and gestures towards the murky and mysterious water of the river with his hand in a way that asks, “Well?”

“I really don’t know about this.” Matt mumbles after walking to the edge. His hands rest on the concrete siding as he peers down over, wondering how far of a drop it is, if the water is even safe to be in. A sudden current of wind begins gusting incessantly, whistling in his ear and splaying his hair into his eyes as he gazes back over his shoulder at an impatient looking Ryan with worried brows.

Ryan groans, the wind blowing his own untamed hair around carelessly before momentarily calming again.

“Look, it’s not even that bad. I’ve done it plenty of times.” He assures Matt. As if words like that, from someone like him, are supposed to make Matt feel any better at all.

This is probably illegal, Matt bets. What would his father say if he found out about this? It's not the first time that possibility has crossed his mind, and no matter how many times he thinks about it, it doesn’t get any easier to stomach. He can picture such a scolding, too: disappointment and distaste personified, those eyes narrowed and nostrils flaring as he chastises Matt like a child. And Matt’s not a child, he’s _not_ , but he’s remained so irrevocably pure and obedient thus far that he can’t exactly blame his parents for still treating him like one.

“Matt,” Ryan breaks his train of thought, crashes it, more like, and Matt’s suddenly tuned into the fact that Ryan is now beside him, leaning to inspect the dark and deceivingly gently flowing water for himself.

“Do it before the storm hits. I don’t want to get struck by lightning today, okay?”

“Well, I’m nervous, _okay?_ ” Matt mocks, the unease having built to a constant uncomfortable churn in his gut. “And anyway,” He adds, in a desperate effort to change the subject and focus on something else, something other than _this_ , “The chances of you getting hit by lightning are very slim.”

“I have bad luck.” Ryan retorts simply, shrugging, as if that warrants his improbable fear.

“Having bad luck is better than having no luck at all, right?” Matt asks, and he can hear the vexed sigh Ryan lets out as a result of his incessant optimism. Really an ill-fitting pair, they are.

“Seriously, I don’t have all day! Just go ahead and jump already.” He’s back to hounding Matt, as if he's just remembered why they're there. It's almost to the point where Matt would rather head back home and partake in the discomfort that is the obligatory recounting of his day with his father, his mind still teetering and trying to decide who here is the lesser of two unfavorable options. Anything other than standing here on this bridge with the dark clouds and the gall of the wind seems like the better option at this point. Matt’s unable to figure out why he bothering to put up with Ryan’s ineffective coercing.

Matt’s shaking his head at himself, internal monologue reeling with goads of, “Don’t be a loser!” and, “What’s the harm in living a little for once?”, and he’s just now deciding on not thinking and just _doing_ , and he’s about to lift himself to settle on the edge of the railing, his hands tender on the cold grain of the concrete, shaking, and he’s watching the protruding blue of his veins twitch on the back of his hand, wondering how deep the water is, why he thinks he needs to prove himself, why he’s never been able to prove himself before, if he should kick his shoes off first, if-

“Oh, for fuck’s sake,” Ryan grates irritably at the beginnings of pattering rainfall hitting the ground, and it takes a moment for the pattering relief to fully register and wash over Matt and his erratically pounding heart. He takes his hands away from the bridge to wipe away a raindrop from the tip of his nose, relishing in the thunder that the sky rolls out above him. That was God, it must’ve been, Matt thinks as he backs away from the edge of the bridge and turns to follow after Ryan who’s stomping away in aggravation. The rain starts to pick up again, and the wind tousles his hair and raises goosebumps to his skin, and miraculously, Matt’s slightly dubious faith in a higher being is locked in for at least another fleeting day.

By the time Ryan’s dragging of his feet has turned into fleeing strides, a bit of his fear of lightning has symptomatically been transferred on to Matt. They both hurry along the downhill slope of a street, racing the quickening flow of water headed towards the storm drains. Under typical conditions, each of them hold a different consideration for caution- but in the throes of the sideways rain and thunderous sky, their state of affairs finds them both tossing it to the wind circumstantially regardless. It's only by the time that they reach a familiar crossroads, a four-way stop with one of the stop signs bent nearly all the way to the ground, that Matt realizes that he’s successfully chased after Ryan all the way home- again. How does it continue to come to this?

A drawn out and heaving crash of thunder has Ryan fumbling just a little faster, maybe too proud to ever say that he’s afraid, but too worried now to realize that he’s showing it. And Matt’s following, sure, but as Ryan eventually reaches those shabby front steps of his home and goes about bustling through the unlocked door, Matt’s still standing feet away in the middle of the street, wondering what he should be doing with himself as the sky rains heavy buckets down on his shoulders.

After a flustered glance back towards his counterpart and an additional and more incredulous double take, from the doorway Ryan raises his voice above the pavement’s beating rain, “What the fuck are you doing? Get inside already!”

And if Matt was indecisive, the recurring fear of upsetting those around him pushes him to a resolution more deftly than the treacherous lightning ever could.

It feels strange and uncomfortable and wrong, being back in Ryan’s home. With the smell of cigarette smoke clinging to aged wallpaper and the carpet beneath him frayed with its wear, Matt knows that someone like himself doesn't belong, even in his current disheveled state that seems to tie in with the rest of the room.

Not too much later after they’d both taken shelter, the front door closing as a rather dubious seal to the storm behind them, Ryan had muttered a weary, “ _Fuck_ ,” at a leak in the ceiling and the rainwater that had collected into the carpet beneath it. And after fumbling through the kitchen and then heading off to rifle through a mystery door down the short hallway, Matt was left to his own devices- now standing in the place of a missing cheery welcome mat, clothes drenched and dripping, and wondering if it would be rude to just turn around and leave. Would Ryan take offense to Matt’s preference for the lightning and her rainy gales over being in his presence?

It's different when they're wandering the streets, going to places Matt hasn't ever known to exist, even after years of living in the same town. It's different because, whether they agreed to a hesitant friendship or not, their time spent together still feels vaguely obligatory. Like they aren't doing the other any favors, or committing to something as real as a close companionship. They just happen to be around the other when it’s convenient, and so they keep at it. Because Ryan still bears a hidden badge of loneliness that Matt can’t for the life of him manage to forget, and because the pastor waits up for Matt every night, waiting to ask where he's been, what he's done to be productive that day.

The thing is, though, that when Matt’s stood by a coat rack with a missing hook and an end table decorated with old candy wrappers and a full ashtray, it all feels different. Wrong, even. He feels as intrusive as the images in his head of Ryan sat angry and broken on the same worn and dirty floor, where he was only two weeks ago when Matt disrupted his privacy.

They haven't mentioned it since, not even once.

“This place is such a shithole,” Ryan mutters with a sullen bite as his steps creak back towards Matt. He places a dried out paint bucket that he’s retrieved underneath the incessantly dribbling crack in the ceiling, the rain pattering against the metal to mediate the silence between them.

Still stagnant, standing awkward and strange, Matt pipes up before he can think to bite his tongue, “Why don't you move somewhere else?”

Ryan eyes shift to him for a moment, a bit skeptical and a bit incredulous, but he doesn't hold his gaze for long. “The rent is cheap.” He informs simply, and then grins snidely when he adds, “Dirt cheap, just like me.”

He looks over to Matt, as if he’s searching for his smirk to be matched, expecting Matt to laugh at his blow at himself. Maybe it’s something someone else was supposed to laugh at, a different friend during a different time. Either way, Matt doesn’t think it’s funny more than a little sad, and he doesn’t have long to put much more thought into it than that, to uselessly try and figure out someone so void of most emotion, before the moment is gone. Ryan drops the small, barely there smile, the only size he seems to know how to bear, and picks up where he left off like he never said anything more.

“Some old woman owns it and doesn't ask for much. I don't _make_ much, so it works out.”

He runs a hand through his wet hair, tangled more than usual by the rain that ruined his plans. With a shrug to himself, Ryan says, “It could be worse. It's only bad when it rains like this. I guess I could just fix the damn ceiling, or…” He trails off, tilting his head up at the ceiling in question, before letting his eyes wander around the rest of the disheveled living room. He huffs a little to himself, looking defeated but resigned.

“There's a lot of things in here that need to be fixed. But it's not the end of the world if they stay broken.”

And Matt doesn’t feel like commenting that things could be _better_ if he _did_ bother to fix them, though he most definitely thinks it, and believes it. Instead, he just watches wordlessly as Ryan shucks off his jacket, letting the soaked thing fall to the floor with a dull and wet thump.

The sight, for some reason, tunes Matt into the fact that he's growing colder by the minute, his own sopping shirt clinging to his skin with frigid defiance, despite the warmth the humid rainfall harbors outside. A shiver whispers up his spine to his shoulders, and Matt wraps his arms around himself, suddenly feeling awful for dripping more water onto Ryan's floor as he just dawdles there stupidly. _I should go_ , he begins to think, and suddenly it’s as though he’s unable to stray from the thought.

_I shouldn't be here, it's not like we’re even very good friends, this isn't my house, he doesn't want me in here, is he thinking of the last time too, why did it have to rain-_

“Do you want, like, a towel? Or something?” Ryan asks with a tone so skillfully even and apathetic as he glances over Matt, looking incredibly unimpressed. He sounds as though he couldn’t be bothered to actually know what Matt’s answer is. Matt wonders how he manages to always remain, or at least seem, indifferent to the world around him. He wonders if it took a lot of practice, or if people treated Ryan so poorly that it just became a habit of his.

Matt shakes his head, laughing short and nervous, void of humor, “No, I-I’m good.”

“I mean, I don’t know. You look like a drowned cat.”

“It’s fine.” He holds back the, “I’m heading home now, anyway,” that he feels creeping up his throat to follow. Ryan stares at him some more, and looks closer at the scruffy shag carpet that’s sopping beneath Matt’s feet.

“Well, you're dripping water all over my floor, so, I’m getting a towel.” He says matter of factly, turning to journey back down the corridor again and also raising his voice over his shoulder as he goes, “And just leave your shoes by the door there, I guess.”

When Ryan returns minutes later , Matt’s shoes are still on, and his hand is still hovering close to the doorknob. It’s just rain- he’s already soaked, and it’s not as though getting a little wetter on his way home will do any more harm.

But then he’s handed a towel, a worn thing with a couple of small holes throughout, and Matt can’t find it in himself to refuse to stay. Or rather, he can, because the majority of him is urging that he’s overstaying an already dubious and unsolicited welcome- but he’s unable to defy his polite upbringing and the apprehensive show of hospitality. Ryan has dry clothes on now, as well, and Matt feels like he doesn’t know what to do with himself as he moves to a rickety wooden dining chair a little ways away, full of notches and wear, and settles in to stay and wait out the storm.

There’s a TV sat crookedly across from the sofa Ryan’s settled on, but he tells Matt that he doesn’t have cable, so he doesn’t turn it on. It’s then that the silence between them really has a chance to dig in, louder than the rain that hits the windows and more uncomfortable than the damp clothes on Matt’s back. He wishes Ryan would just click the stupid TV on. He wishes he’d never even come inside.

“Is there a reason you’re afraid of thunderstorms?” Matt finds himself asking as a brilliant flash of lightning brightens the room in a vibrant flicker, casting short-lived shadows onto the dimly-lit room and a fleeting glimpse of faint dread across Ryan’s features. Maybe it’s a fairly justifiable fear, but Matt can’t think of a time he hasn’t welcomed the spewing rain spouts and showers against his own window at home. Though, it’s not the first time he and Ryan’s views have opposed one another. People like the two of them probably just aren’t meant to see eye to eye.

Ryan crosses his arms, settling back further into the armchair he’s made himself comfortable in. He looks mildly annoyed, but Matt doesn’t think that he’s ever seen him look much different.

“I’m not afraid of storms,” He quips, and tacks on assuredly thereafter, “I’m not afraid of anything.” His words are all bold and intrepid, like he’s daring Matt to challenge the validity of them. Of course, Matt just averts his eyes, and doesn’t accept the bait.

“I don’t know, you seemed kind of scared, running back to your house.” Matt reminisces, a bit smug, unwarranted in his bravery to be so.

“It’s not unreasonable to not want to be struck by lightning.” Ryan tells him with a huff of defiance. And then he reaches for a remote that looks like it might be a little busted, and Ryan leans back to light a cigarette as the old CRT television blinks into a slightly fuzzy picture on screen. Matt accepts it as the official end to their small and meaningless conversation, appreciating the faintly distorted sound of the program to keep any more uneasy chats with Ryan at bay.

\--

Three weeks. It’s been three weeks since Matt has seen Chris at church, or anywhere, for that matter, and he’s worried. Maybe with what Ryan says about him, Matt shouldn’t bother still caring where Chris is or what he’s up to, but with how long they’ve known each other, it’s hard not for Matt to just be concerned for Chris as a friend, someone he cares about. Chris _did_ go through a breakup, after all- maybe he’s taking it harder than Matt could expect him to.

Or maybe he’s running from the truth, afraid of word getting around the the church’s loyal Sunday school teacher is into men.

Matt finds some relief to relish in as he changes out of his formal Sunday getup in the church bathroom, the t-shirt a loose, welcome change to the rigid way he feels in his usual neutral button downs. Why someone one day decided that church attire was destined to be forever formal, Matt has no idea. Surely God is too divine to actually waste his time caring what his people are wearing.

Matt stares himself down in the bathroom mirror, taking in his own furrowed brow and the strand of defiant hair falling into his eyes, and his thoughts can’t seem to stop wandering back to Chris. Curiosity has him wondering where he’s off to, and if Chris is mad at him for not doing something to help better defend him against Ryan the last time that they saw each other. But then another recurring, _pestering_ thought surfaces, too- what Ryan said to him when he first barged into his living room and asked him things he didn’t have the right to know.

“Stop trying to question things you don’t understand.”

It’s sound advice, Matt figures, and if there’s anything Ryan says that Matt should actually listen to, that statement is among the few that are worthwhile. Chris is fine, surely. And either way, it isn’t Matt’s business if he isn’t. Even if it _were_ his business, Matt’s sure that, of all the Christian virgins in town still pining for their first kiss, he might just be the last person around that could properly empathize with someone fresh out of a messy relationship, anyway.

He shakes his head at his own reflection, doing his best to shake the fretting away too. He heads from the bathroom, then, making his way out of the sanctuary’s double doors. He purposely took longer getting changed just to avoid the departing service’s crowd, and it seems as though he was successful in gaining a little more solitude than he maybe deserves. There are only a few people left outside, talking amongst themselves, catching up on one another’s lives. Matt just can’t fathom how they can manage to still be so lively in such an awful and stifling heat. It’s the perfect day to stay indoors, Matt thinks, with the AC on high and no one to bother him while his father preaches at the late services and his mom attends her bingo game.

It’s a shame that he doesn’t even get halfway down the sidewalk before his father finds him, anyway.

“Where are you headed off to?” The pastor asks, eyes squinting at the sun. He’s not frowning as much as he might be usually, and good, he’s in an okay mood today. Probably still basking in the praise he received of his sermon. Maybe he’ll actually just let Matt relax for once.

“Just back home.” Matt says with a compulsory smile, and he _knows_ he shouldn’t have answered so honestly, not when during the summers, if Matt’s caught inside the house doing nothing, the pastor is there trying to usher him right back outside, to do anything other than, “Waste the time God has granted him to live a full life.” The expectations really are impeding, neverending. But it’s not as though Matt’s much one for lying at all, anyway, especially not to his dad, and especially not right outside the church- as if God isn’t already watching his every move all the time.

“I-I was going to maybe start on making something for the bake sale next week?” He’s quick to add, because that sounds productive, doesn’t it? The “maybe” differentiates it from a lie, because well, _maybe_ he was. Maybe.

“That sounds like a good idea,” The preacher says, surprising Matt a little with his simple compliance.

“If you could, though,” He continues, and sure, Matt should’ve known that being granted a little time to himself wasn’t ever going to be that easy, “Just drop by the farmer’s market on the way home for me, okay? Your mom and I have been meaning to buy some produce.”

It’s not really on the way home, but Matt can’t say anything but, “Okay,” before he receives a verbal list of what he’s meant to buy and turns to head on his way.

Matt’s in the middle of dreading a walk in this heat and checking his pockets for cash when he sees a familiar face walking his way, moving in a direct line toward the church. Matt hopes it doesn’t show too plainly on his face that he’s panicking a little.

Sure, his dad was the one that put him up to their initial agreement in the first place, but Matt still feels like he doesn’t want his dad to see him with Ryan. As if anyone actually cares what the two of them, so trifling among all other distractions and more notable people, are up to. It might more reasonably be that, the last time Ryan was near the church, he almost caused something of a scene among all of the senior citizens and their breakfasts. Perhaps no one really noticed or cared, but Matt can't help but feel that it’s not exactly a place where Ryan belongs.

“Where are you headed off to?” Ryan asks casually once Matt is within earshot, and Matt thinks that he’s been flattering himself, that Ryan was in the middle of going somewhere else to see someone different, and they only happened to cross paths by chance. Because they are friends, he guesses, if he had to put an official title on it, but they both remain just barely beyond the line of strange and often acutely uncomfortable acquaintances. Matt’s pretty sure that Ryan doesn’t actually like him all that much. It’s clear at this point that he must only stick around because there’s really nothing better to do.

“I’m going vegetable shopping for my dad.”

“Oh, we’re going to the farmer’s market? That’s perfect timing, dude, I’ve actually been craving watermelon lately.”

Matt falters for a moment then, raises an eyebrow as he asks, “We?”

“Yeah,” Ryan says, shrugging, “You’re stuck with me and there’s nothing you can do about it.”

Can’t argue with that, Matt figures, and maybe doesn’t actually mind the accompaniment much at all.

They start off together in silence, towards the market stalls downtown, and Matt feels a little uneasy in the silence between them. A dog barks behind a fence they pass, cicadas buzz nearby, and maybe the unspoken words between them wouldn’t feel all that prominent if it weren’t for Matt’s incessant urge to ask Ryan about his ex-boyfriend.

It’s still heavy on his mind, he can’t help it- Ryan of all people could actually know where Chris would be, or how to get in contact with him. However, just one look over at Ryan tells Matt that bringing up something that's still freshly stinging wouldn't be in his best interest, and he should really keep his mouth shut and his will to intrude confined. Ryan looks, if only slightly, less grumpy than usual, and the last thing Matt wants to do is ruin today’s good luck by starting another conversation that spirals down into an argument in record time. If Ryan is in a bad mood, which is usually, he definitely won’t be down for Matt’s games. And if he’s not in a bad mood, then Matt’s prying will surely get him there.

It really is a wonder to Matt how Ryan and Chris ever survived as a couple at all, regardless of how they managed to see it all crash and burn in the end, anyway. From what Matt knew, Chris was sweet and thoughtful, always giving and putting others before himself. His patience and all of his good nature must’ve just been wasted on someone like Ryan- ill-tempered, stubborn and intense, and often times just flat-out mean.

It could be, Matt reasons as he walks along, eyes trained to the pavement beneath his feet, sun shining hot on the back of his neck, that he didn’t know Chris as well as he might’ve hoped. Maybe his religious and amiable front was a coverup for his scandalous relationship with another man. It seems stupid to think it, because it’s not like anyone would _really_ care who he dated. A select few might shake their heads, but aside from those handful of people from the church, most folks around town tended to avert their eyes and adhere to their own business instead of getting caught up in things so fruitless and uninviting as gossip about strangers.

Matt glances back over his shoulder at Ryan, trailing behind him up the slight hill of Juniper Street they’re ascending. If he never really knew Chris after all, then who’s to say that Matt knows a single thing about Ryan, either? It’s a sudden and unnerving thought, to think that someone he’s meant to be warming up to couldn't be any further from his reach. The doubt momentarily subsides when Matt realizes Ryan’s looking back at him now. He’s got an eyebrow arched in question, and although he’s dressed in his usual all black and must be sweating it out under such a mercilessly shining sun, Ryan looks just a little less miserable than usual today. His hair’s tied back and pushed out of his face, and his expression seems more eased and relaxed, a change from the way he always seems to look a little angry at someone or something.

Matt figures that maybe he _doesn’t_ really know Ryan, doesn’t know much at all of what's beyond his impassive wall he’s put up to protect himself, and the short temper he harbors- but that doesn’t mean that he can’t, at the very least, try to.

\--

Matt scans Ryan up and down with narrowed eyes, trying in vain to at least _slightly_ intimidate him. It’s not working to his advantage, and he knows it, but he just doesn’t buy the innocence Ryan is feigning one bit.

“Are you _sure_ you don’t have any eights?” Matt asks again, grimacing as Ryan reaches for the dented flask next to his feet and pours some more of whatever it is into his bottle of lemonade. It was Ryan’s idea to pick them up from the farmer’s market - with Matt’s money, of course - but if Matt knew he was just going to use it as an excuse to drink, he probably wouldn’t have caved. Probably.

“Dude, I told you! I don’t have any fuckin’ eights! Just draw your card already and admit that you’re losing.” Ryan retorts, taking a swig of his spiked lemonade that’s likely more alcohol than lemon at this point, and smirking at Matt complacently.

Defeated, though still unwilling to believe the statement as a truth, Matt says no more and decides to draw his card, reaching to the deck between their cross-legged figures and refraining from making some snide remark, because he’s isn’t a sore loser, he’s _not._

“Okay,” Matt says, staring a little indignantly at his growing hand of playing cards, “Never have I ever… broken a bone.”

They’re hopping from one game to the other, creating some strange, in-between version that Matt’s decided to call, “Never Have I Ever Gone Fishing.” Despite the countless rude remarks Ryan initially had to say about it, his incessant pressings of, “Why can’t we just play poker instead?” eventually ended, and he seemed to settle comfortably into the easy afternoon. Matt’s enjoying himself too, which surprises him more than it should when the notion first dawns on him. Only a mere three weeks or so ago it seemed impossible that Matt would ever be okay with hanging around Ryan, let alone ever truly welcome his company. But they’re sat in the old abandoned house with its dusty floors and its pried up baseboards, and everything is, miraculously, serenely copacetic.

“Yeah, I’ve broken my arm, wrist, and collarbone before,” Ryan lists off nonchalantly, leaving Matt to raise his eyebrows in an incredulous response.

“Oh right, I forgot, and I also broke these two fingers a few months ago.”

“What in the world do you do to break that many bones?” Matt wonders aloud, and decides that he might be better off not knowing when Ryan only shrugs and continues on to ask if Matt has any fives.

Ryan is the next to begrudgingly draw a card once Matt smugly shakes his head, and he squints his eyes a little in thought before he says, “Never have I ever had a surprise party thrown for me.”

“I have, actually. My mom went all out for my thirteenth birthday and got all my friends together at the bowling alley downtown to surprise me. It was really nice of her. I haven’t had a birthday party since then, though. My dad thinks that I’m too old for them, apparently.”

“I can’t remember the last time I had a birthday party. They seemed stupider as I got older, but I always wanted someone to care enough to throw me a surprise party, you know?”

There’s this silence that then wedges between them, then, a bit uncomfortable and stagnant and dragging, but Matt takes another look at his hand of cards and blinks a couple times until he can feel the pity he knows Ryan doesn’t want slowly melt away, to be dealt with and not thought about at a later and less inconvenient time.

“Okay,” Matt thinks as he lays a newly acquired pair of threes down beside him, and for a moment, though there’s an admittedly long list of things that others his age have done that he hasn't gotten around to, Matt feels a little stuck. That is, until Ryan reaches for another sip of his lemonade and Matt springs at the opportunity to admit even more staleness to his already uneventful life, so dull in comparison to Ryan's endeavors.

“Oh! Never have I ever drank alcohol.”

Ryan smirks around the mouth of his glass bottle, amusedly shaking his head. “Well, I could have guessed that one, you holy Christian boy.” It’s rude, all snide and awful, but Matt doesn’t have it in him to argue at what equates to be the mere drop of a hat. Every day now he finds it less and less of an issue to get worked up about every comment that Ryan has in him, because they’re frequent and ceaseless, and Matt knows that fighting them is way beyond a lost cause.

“You’re a jerk.” Matt says with a roll of his eyes, the scorn and contempt needed to drive the mild insult home lacking as he begins to grin, despite himself.

“What? I’m a jerk just because I make very reasonable assumptions?”

“No, you’re a jerk just because you’re a jerk. Now go, it’s your turn now.”

Ryan throws his cards to lay face-up on the ground, having seemingly given up on their less than intense game, and okay, he totally is a jerk because he _did_ have an eight. Matt glares at him uselessly, but Ryan’s eyes are closed as he leans back against the base of the sofa he’s sat in front of, hand still curled loosely around the neck of the lemonade that’s almost completely warm by now.

“Let’s see…,” He sighs, as if he’s running through some long checklist of the stupid things he’s done in his head and is having trouble finding one he’s never actually ventured to do.

“Never have I ever- oh wait, no, I did do that.”

“Done what?”

“Dyed my hair. Can you imagine me with blue hair?” Ryan smirks, his head leaned back and his eyes still closed, most likely recalling a memory, but he doesn’t elaborate any further. Matt, slightly surprised but not entirely all that put off, tries to entertain the image while Ryan scrambles for something else. From what he can picture it to look like, Matt thinks that the color wouldn’t actually look half bad on him.

“Alright, never have I ever ridden a horse.”

“Neither have I. They kind of freak me out.” Matt admits, and he feels oddly triumphant when Ryan opens his eyes to lock with Matt’s own, showing the smallest of reluctant grins while replying, “Yeah, me too.”

“So, never have I ever shoplifted from a store.” Matt says next, and Ryan sits up straighter now, like he can’t believe Matt had it in him to actually say it.

“You asshole,” He says, pointing an accusatory finger despite the broadening of his smile, “First the alcohol and now this? You’re totally just saying stuff you know I’ve done.”

“Maybe I am, maybe I’m not.” Matt challenges, feeling absurdly bold, the feeling surging in his chest with an incessant mix of giddiness and glee. It’s never dawned on him until just now how boring his summer had been without someone else to spend it with, regardless of who they even were. Maybe the two of them aren’t the epitome of a typical summer vacation, but even as sweat collects on his forehead and he breathes in the dust he can see glinting in the glow of the sun that’s streaming in, it’s pleasing to know that he’s not wasting his life memorizing Deuteronomy, but actually savoring the company of a _friend_ instead.

“Fine then,” Ryan says, this glint in his eye, similar to when he told Matt that they were going to jump off a bridge. Mischievous. A little terrifying.

“Never have I ever gotten head in a church.”

Matt thinks his heart stops for a moment. He’s bewildered- he doesn’t talk about anything like this to _anyone_ , and the fact that Ryan might actually suspect that he’s gone anywhere beyond nervously asking a girl if she wanted punch at his middle school dance eight years ago? It’s astounding, and he’s caught off guard. So much so that the burning of his blush doesn’t even set in for a whole two seconds. Once it does, though, it seems to be stubbornly staying put, and suddenly Matt wishes he could hide behind his hands and wipe the embarrassment away, anything that would guarantee an escape from Ryan’s expectant and amused stare

“Wh-What? You really think- Jesus, no! No, definitely, I have _not_ done that.”

“Really? I thought Christians were the secretly kinky type, exhibitionism and all that. You know, like band kids.”

No, Matt doesn’t know, and he doesn’t know what exhibitionhism is either, nor is he ever, _ever_ going to ask.

“Yes _really_ , Ryan, jeez…”

“But I can totally picture it! Some chick still in her Sunday dress, and you sitting in one of those stupid wooden seats. Maybe you’re even like, reading from the Bible of something while she’s on her knees in front-,

“No, no! Please stop, please. That’s not… I mean, I-I haven’t even- I don’t know, I’ve never even kissed anyone before.” His voice is a quiet and reluctant opposition to the shrill, frantic way he’d just denied Ryan’s speculations. It’s beyond embarrassing to say it out loud, but he figures if there were ever a time to admit something so lame to Ryan, now would be it.

Ryan stares at him wordlessly, and it seems like this is another one of those times where, yeah, Matt should’ve figured Ryan most likely already made that assumption. It looks as though Ryan may be ready to say something more, though, most likely ready pester and mock Matt’s nervously boring life- but before he can, the ever familiar roll of thunder reaches their isolated and run down little hiding place. Saved by the weather.

As Matt stretches to peer out of one of the broken windows, he notes that it thankfully hasn’t yet started to rain. It’s not exactly the best of places to wait until it does, though. Ryan’s haste is evident as he rushes toward the doorway to avoid the imminent and deadly lightning that, he has yet to realize, wants absolutely nothing to do with him.

Matt has been finding it an annoying habit as of late to always wander back to Ryan’s place. It’s sort of on the way to his own house from a few places, he reasons, and it doesn’t seem as though Ryan minds much. Admittedly, it also feels less and less like an invasion of privacy the more he does it, which in turn allows the unusual friendship of theirs to blossom even more crudely, if only slightly so. Regardless, though, Matt can’t stay and chat this time around, and he tells Ryan this once again.

“I really can’t,” He says, feeling the clouds finally begin to unleash their impatient storm in a peppering sprinkle just as they reach Ryan’s crooked doorstep. He sighs as he dares a look up at the clouds, and sees the sun shining across the way on the side of town that hasn’t yet been overcome with the dark and the rain. Matt bets it’ll pick up on his walk home, and he’s mainly just dreading getting his shoes wet again after they’ve only just recently finished drying from the last surprise storm. Why it’s been raining so much lately is beyond him. Maybe God is upset.

“Are you just scared I’ll kick your ass at go fish again?” Ryan taunts, and Matt scoffs at his nerve.

“You mean you’ll _cheat_ at go fish again?”

“I never said I didn’t cheat, I just said I’d kick your ass.”

“Whatever, but no. I just can’t stay. I told my dad I was going to the library and they close at eight, so. He’ll probably be expecting me home soon.”

“Yeah, that seems like something lame that you’d do.” Ryan retorts, and Matt almost tries quipping back before realizing he’s lost the battle before it’s begun. There’s never any sense in arguing with Ryan about most things. About anything, really. Funny how they nearly always tend to find themselves knee-deep in some sort of argument day by day, anyway, because Matt sometimes can’t help but give in and retort back.

A strike of lightning cracks through the sky somewhere behind Matt’s figure, flashing bright in Ryan’s eyes. And he knows Ryan’s anxiety must be growing by the way he stares over Matt’s shoulder in a brazen mix of awe and fear, looking on at the sunny gray sky as though he can’t seem to understand how it wasn’t just split in two.

“Well, I think I have an umbrella in here somewhere, so,” Ryan rushes, and then he’s tugging Matt inside by the elbow and slamming the door closed behind him before Matt can even think to politely decline. Ryan quickly disappears off into a door down along his hallway, and Matt can hear him shuffling around through what sounds like a really big mess. He sighs, and looks around the growingly familiar living room, hands suddenly full of time to kill.

There are Chinese takeout boxes leftover on the coffee table, a broken lamp lying on the brown shag carpet, and a corded landline a little ways away on an end table that isn’t plugged in. As small and dingy as the place is, it seems more lived in than Matt once initially believed. He wonders how much time Ryan actually spends here, if he likes going out more because he feels less suffocated and stir crazy when he’s idly wandering around town. And Matt wonders what Ryan gets up to when he’s finally driven back to and faced with his unavoidable solitude, nothing for company but the same flickering kitchen light and stacks of old movies on DVD from the early 2000’s.

So Matt’s only curious, and his eyes wander where they want to- it’s not like he looks for trouble to get into. As the pastor’s son, that’s the last thing he ever does, ever _wants_ to do. But once his worried blues catch on something out of place, it sticks out so sorely and obviously that the way he drifts over to investigate feels like it really can’t be helped. On top of the coffee table and between a couple of old magazines dated from six years ago, there’s a bag half full of these little white pills. They seem all chalky and meaningless, but Matt feels an immediate well of worry surfacing as his mind incessantly wonders; is this what he thinks it is?

Suddenly Ryan’s there, come back from his rummaging, and Matt’s holding this… this bag of _something_ in his hand, and he doesn’t know what to do. What is he supposed to do?

“What the hell are you doing.” Ryan asks, his voice dangerously even, monotonous in a mean, desolate way. He advances towards Matt, who’s stood unmoving next to the broken lamp and old home improvement magazines, feeling rigid and shaken and scared. Ryan snatches the bag away forcefully, but keeps his eyes trained on Matt, insistently waiting for an answer.

“I-I was just-,”

“You were just _what_ , Matt?” He asks, but hardly waits for an answer that might not have ever come.

“You know, I don’t even care. I found your fucking umbrella, so leave.” And he presses the thing assertively to Matt’s chest, before turning his back on him and bowing his head down toward the bag in his hands. Matt’s so close to the door, he could take the easy way out now- he doesn’t even know why he says it, he doesn’t know why he always says the things that’d he’d be better off keeping to himself.

“The church,” He begins, words feeble and timid, like his brain knows he shouldn’t be digging himself deeper but his throat is working to conspire against him, “They hold anonymous rehab meetings on Thursday nights. I-I don’t know, if, maybe you-,”

“I quit.” Ryan interjects roughly, spitting over his shoulder without fully turning his head. And then he’s storming down the hall to turn a corner so that Matt can’t see his hunched shoulders anymore. _Stupid_ , he feels so stupid, always so wrong and so absolutely foolish. Whilst clutching at the rusty umbrella, Matt takes that as his telltale cue to let himself out.

He begins to walk home in the rain, the water collected on the uneven pavement soaking almost immediately into his shoes. And as soon as he realizes that the old beaten umbrella has a tear in it, rendering it useless, he also realizes that the sun is no longer anywhere to be seen from behind the deep blue clouds in the sky.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> everyone who comments is entered into a raffle to win my profound and undying love and gratitude! let's see who wins!!!


	4. Sugar Water

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> anyone wanna go swimming?
> 
> the awful ms paint gallery  
> [ryan's house](https://ibb.co/fWqXsp)  
> [the church](https://ibb.co/i7AAdU)  
> [entire town map](https://ibb.co/hNirk9)

“Seriously, are you _crazy?_ ” Matt exasperates, flailing his hands as if to better convey that he really and honestly believes Ryan might be out of his mind. And he paces, too, averting his gaze away from Ryan and refusing to watch him scale the lattice fence with unnerving ease and skill. Instead, Matt looks up at the stars, and focuses on one that looks as though it’s blinking at him- doing really anything to avoid the rising compulsion he has to clamber over the fence after Ryan. If he acknowledges it, that would just mean having to admit that he himself is crazy, too.

“Don’t be such a baby, just climb over, it’s not hard.” Ryan provokes after dropping back down on the other side with a huff. He narrows his eyes a little at Matt through the gaps in the fence, challenging him with a gaze that he seems to know will get under Matt’s skin. Annoyingly enough, it’s working, too.

And then Ryan disappears, walking further into the pool grounds, _away_. With another long gaze up at the dark and forgiving sky, Matt asks in a quick and silent prayer that God not judge him too harshly for doing this.

Matt swears that he does it so as not to be left alone, standing outside of the locked gate and adjacent to the sign that prohibits trespassing. If they were to get caught now, he reasons, as he places unsure footing and grabs ahold of cold metal with unsure fingers, it’d be with Ryan at his side, and they’d both drown in the same sinking ship together. In the back of his mind, though, Matt knows more realistically that, if they did get caught trespassing, he’d sooner just pin the blame on Ryan rather than heroically fail with him.

Matt hisses through his teeth as a jagged barb along the otherwise harmless lattice scratches at the back of his hand, a thin line just below his knuckles. He thinks, as he swings a wobbly leg over the fence, that it’s God’s way of reminding him that he’s watching. Right then, though, it’s surprisingly easy to just push the thoughts of judgment and punishment away and to just _do_ rather than think all the time. Matt’s found that it’s usually easier to keep that mindset whenever he’s with Ryan.

Beyond the gate, there’s a tranquil atmosphere that Matt feels as though he’s just slipped into, all blurred from the reality outside. It's relaxing, and suddenly the fear of getting caught dissipates into the thrill of adventure that Matt feels himself succumbing to. The lights of the public swimming pool are still on under the water, and the moon does the rest of the work illuminating the area in a peaceful glow. Ryan is already settled into a plastic lounge chair, looking so lonely and out of place in a position that’s usually reserved for sunbathing housewives. However abnormal a sight it is, though, Ryan looks peaceful above all else as he sits looking over the unnatural blue-green complexion of the water. In its untouched state after hours, the pool that’s overflowing with activity during the day could now just as easily be mistaken for a glassed over slice of heavily chlorinated nirvana.

Matt walks with cautious steps, all but tiptoeing, as if afraid someone is around that’ll hear him. Here, though, they’re on their own. Venturing further into the quiet lounge area, Matt eventually reaches Ryan, who's overlooking the rest of the row of isolated chairs. He moves to tentatively sit in the seat to the right of him, and then feels like he should hold his breath, awaiting Ryan’s next move. That seems to be all he’s done thus far, anyway- waiting and hoping Ryan will explain what the hell they’re up to. Since Ryan showed up at the church while Matt was in late with his dad and convinced him to venture to the pool with him, Matt hasn’t been sure what exactly to think.

And when Ryan finally gets to saying something other than a few quips and remarks to coax into following, Matt can’t say it’s what he was expecting to hear.

“You thirsty?”

Matt’s head tilts in a silent question, just before Ryan answers it by pulling a cheap six pack of canned beer and a bottle of something else out of the mysterious plastic grocery bag he’s been hauling since they silently departed the church’s walkway together. After blinking a couple times and assessing the situation, Matt can’t honestly say that he’s very surprised, despite being utterly wordless and unsure of what move to make next.

“I don’t-,” Ryan begins, but he falters and sighs as though he’s unsure of how to continue. He sets the alcohol back down beside him, the glass and aluminum thudding lightly on the ground, and seems to make a point of not looking in Matt’s direction. While his hard eyes stay trained on the smooth and still surface of the illuminated pool, Matt stares intently and patiently at his profile, trying to gain some sort of sense of what Ryan’s thinking.

“I don’t mean to be such an asshole. It just comes naturally to me.” Ryan finally says evenly, and it’s the way his words are all quiet and profound that makes Matt feel how genuinely Ryan means it, however crudely it’s put.

“I know you think I’m just some fuck-up and a drug addict or something, but I’m not.”

And now Matt starts to get it. Of course this would be about their… less than pleasant interaction only a couple days ago. For a bit there, Matt was figuring that it must not have been as big a deal to Ryan as he thought, considering he hadn’t brought it up at all once they saw each other the very next day. It’s becoming clearer now though that Ryan was just looking for the right way to go about it, which to Matt seems like one of the most rational things he’s ever done. He definitely appreciates it more than getting blown up at again, regardless of however much Matt might’ve deserved such an outburst for snooping.

Ryan sighs, and seems to consider his words before adding on shortly after, “At least, not an addict, anyway.” A collection of summer crickets sing from the dew-covered grass beyond the pool grounds, and Matt appreciates the sound to help alleviate the quiet that ensues as he waits for Ryan to continue. By the way his face contorts pensively, Matt guesses that Ryan’s choosing his words carefully.

“I’ve just- I’ve somehow gotten used to you being around, for some reason? And when you found those pills at my house, I got defensive because that’s just what I do. I push people away instead of just… fuck, I don’t know.”

“Talking about things?” Matt suggests, and Ryan raises one shoulder in a lazy shrug, nodding shallowly in response.

“But I’m trying not to fuck stuff up this time. I don’t want things to be, like... _weird_ between us now. So that’s what we’re doing, I guess. We’re talking.”

“What do you mean?” Matt asks skeptically, unsure of what Ryan’s insinuating. Matt had assumed from the very beginning that, as the pastor’s son and the town delinquent, things were _always_ going to be weird between them, and that it was always supposed to just stay that way.

“I mean, you can ask me anything you want, and I’ll probably answer, while trying not to be a dick about it.” He pauses, and then looks over to seemingly identify Matt’s reaction before he adds, “The only catch is that you have to get drunk with me.”

Immediately, Matt shakes his head in refusal, knowing that something as rare as willing and open emotional vulnerability from Ryan was too good to be true.

“No, that really doesn’t seem like a good idea.” Matt insists in disbelief, shuffling nervously on the lounge chair he’s placed on. The plastic squeaks uncomfortably under his weight.

“Why not? You said just the other day that you’ve never tried it before- don’t you want to know what it’s like?”

“I’m sure I can live with not knowing.”

“Come on-,”

“Ryan, _no!_ I-I’m not even supposed to be out right now, could you imagine if we got caught _drinking_ , too?”

“It’s not that big of a deal, I mean, you’re of age and everything.”

Matt sighs, and he feels his patience dwindling with ever-growing speed. Ryan’s habit of remaining stubborn and unbelievably difficult is well-practiced. With every word he says, Matt knows he’s just inching closer and closer to the inevitable. He’s a pushover, and they both absolutely know it.

“This is stupid. You’re being _stupid_.” Matt mumbles, hands moving to scrub at his face in annoyance.

“Look, the only way I’ll, I don’t know, _open up_ to you about anything is if I’m hammered. And there’s no way I’m gonna sit here and let you learn all my secrets while you’re completely sober.”

It’s admittedly, and annoyingly, very tempting to cave when Ryan puts it like that. Matt’s never been allowed by his parents to drink, not even after his recent 21st birthday, so the idea itself, of defying the two that he answers to, is off-putting, of course. But Ryan’s offering a hell of a deal- if he refuses something like this, he might as well just accept that he’ll never have anything close to an idea of what goes on in Ryan’s head. Which isn’t too huge of a let down, of course not. Matt doesn’t _actually_ care that much.

Really, though, how would his parents ever find out where he’s been? Surely God knows that something like this wouldn’t count as outrightly _lying_.

Matt sighs in this heaving and dramatic way that must be a telltale sign of his resignation. Ryan’s face has already lit up before Matt can mutter with a shake of his head, “You’re the worst.” The alcohol reappears then, and there’s anxiety that pools in Matt’s gut and his throat as he tentatively reaches for the can of moderately chilled beer Ryan holds out to him. The nerves seem relatively easy to ignore, though, especially when Ryan looks so sure of him, and the most content Matt thinks he’s ever seen him.

“So, are we finally playing twenty questions?” Matt asks, voice a little weak. He’s still staring down at the unopened drink in his hand, the condensation collecting on his fingers. He makes conversation as if to distract himself from the fact that he’s still meant to actually consume it.

Ryan huffs out something that actually resembles a laugh, and he responds in an amused tone, “Sure, we can make this twenty questions if you want.”

And he guesses then that he’s delayed it for as long as he can. Matt takes one more glance over at Ryan, who’s gazing back with his eyebrows raised in watchful anticipation, and soon he’s cracked the can open and is taking a reluctant and provisional sip.

Immediately, his face twists unfavorably, his nose scrunched up and his mouth pointed down in a distasteful frown. “That is- wow, that is not good at all. You actually drink this stuff?” Matt asks, incredulous. Despite his better judgement, though, he goes in for another shallow sip before Ryan can even answer, willing to get this over with quickly if he’s really meant to go through with it all.

“Trust me, there’s shit that’s way worse than this. Consider yourself lucky.” Ryan says before he takes a long swig of his own drink. Matt can’t believe he can stomach such an amount at one time, but notes that Ryan seems to be very well-versed in the field of alcohol and must have a lot of practice.

After a few leisurely sips, neither of the two are affected by the sways of the alcohol just yet, but Matt thinks that they’d better get started before they’re fully out of their minds and can’t quite think straight. It’s unnerving to anticipate it coming to that at all, for Matt to expect to lose himself to a bitter brew and a quiet night. There’s always a first time for everything, though, he reasons, and oddly enough, there’s a pinch of comfort in knowing that he’ll at least be winding down with someone he feels he can relatively trust. If only a little.

“Alright,” Matt sputters between unwilling swigs, unenthusiastically yet quickly making his way through close to a third of the can already, “Tell me about you and Chris.”

“Okay then, starting off strong, I see.” Ryan remarks with a raise of his eyebrows, and exhales while scrubbing a free hand over his face tiredly. “Well, what is there to say? I mean, we were a shitty couple from the start- we only ever got together because he was horny in high school and I was too into him for my own good. He wasn’t always _so_ shitty to me, but I was never that great to him, either.”

Ryan looks so pensive as he nods to himself, as is being reminded of something he doesn’t like to think about. Maybe he’s reminded of how bad of a match he and Chris were, and he’s nodding as if to convince himself that it’s still true. Matt would love to know what’s going through his head.

Before continuing, Ryan takes a long drink of his beer and tilts his head back a little as he does. Matt still has his eyes locked on Ryan’s profile, and he can’t help staring at the way Ryan’s throat moves as he swallows.

“In retrospect, I think we never should have dated at all, but when you spend so much of your time with one person, it’s hard to get over them, you know?”

No, Matt doesn’t really know at all- he doesn’t get what it’s like to have invested bouts of emotions and experiences, parts of your life in another person, to rely on them and never want to separate from them. But he refrains from saying so, because it may be more than obvious.

He decides to ask instead, “So do you regret being with him?”

“No,” Ryan replies instantly, as if he expected the question, or as though he asks himself the same thing every day. “I mean, I regret doing stupid shit with him and always saying yes to him even if I was scared to. You know, he’s the reason I got into drugs at all. Those codeine pills back at the house, those were his.” He shakes his head irritably, and the answer stuns Matt, but he holds onto the silence and patiently gives Ryan the time he needs before he continues.

“I… I loved him, at one point,” Ryan sighs quietly, says it as though he’s admitting it for the first time and it’s hard to say. It’s during pauses like this that Matt really wishes he could get a look inside Ryan’s head.

“At least, I thought I did. You never forget how someone made you feel- both the good and the bad parts. So I don’t regret it, really. I just wish things could have played out differently.”

Ryan is looking fixedly out at the moonlit pool with a somber expression, eyes dark and cloudy and hard for Matt to read. Not that he could ever judge how Ryan was feeling in the first place, not really. Ryan doesn’t mention it, but to Matt, it seems as though he’s has had enough of talking about Chris for one night. Matt decides to give him a break for now, not pressing any further to know things that aren’t his business, things that hurt Ryan just to think about. Maybe Ryan has chosen to ultimately lay himself out as an open book for now, but Matt’s not going to be insensitive just because he has an advantage.

“Is there anything else you regret, then?” Matt questions, and he doesn’t quite understand why his voice is coming out so quietly, like he’s afraid of speaking too loudly and breaking the even plane of understanding they’re both leveled out on.

Ryan shifts in his seat, and when he looks back over Matt’s way, there’s this unexpected grin that’s forming on Ryan’s face, spreading all the way to his eyes until they crinkle at the corners and Matt can’t help but smile back.

“I’m totally not drunk enough for this.” He announces, and he crushes the mostly-empty can he’s been working through in the palm of his hand, tossing it aside in favor of reaching for the other bottle he’d shown off earlier. Matt doesn’t know what it is, but when he takes a closer look at it he sees that there’s a picture of a peach on the glass. Peach sounds endlessly more inviting than whatever stuff is in the foul tasting beer he continues to force down his throat.

Only halfway through his own beer can now, Matt eagerly welcomes the bottle Ryan passes into his hand, only slightly registering the warning he recieves of, “Just go slow, okay? I don’t need you throwing up anywhere tonight.”

It sure _smells_ like peach, Matt notes after unscrewing the metal cap, but it’s more artificial and watered down and cheap than anything like an orchard. Determined not to be discouraged by the clear liquid staring back at him, Matt shrugs and brings the mouth of the bottle to his lips, taking a hearty sip with an overabundance of misplaced vigor.

“Oh my _God_ , that’s so much worse! It tastes like hand sanitizer!” Matt splutters, coughing as his throat seems to reject the bitter assault. The liquor remaining on his mouth burns, seeping into a strip of raw skin on his lip that he bites at when under pressure. He licks the excess away with a reluctant swipe of his tongue, and twists his face up even further thereafter. The only good note he can find is that it does seem to taste a little sweeter in smaller doses.

“Fine then, give it back if you’re just going to waste my ten bucks and not even drink it.”

“Really? You paid ten bucks for _that_?”

Ryan scoffs, but his lazy grin hasn’t moved, and he snatches the bottle back and takes a decent sized gulp of it for himself, as if to show Matt that it’s really possible, or to test his nerve. Either way, whatever it is, it works, and Matt scrambles to grab it back and prove his worth. He’s not really the competitive type, or ever very swayed by peer pressure- yet for some reason, right now, he feels like he can’t stand to be shown up.

“So? You never answered my question.” Matt speaks through his grimace after sipping again, He’s trying his best to mask his discomfort, though his efforts are mainly proving to be futile.

“I don’t remember what you asked.” Ryan admits, and suddenly, Matt can’t remember either. It’s fine though, he reasons, because it’s not like there aren’t plenty of other questions that are currently circling his brain. After another drink of the sharp and biting peach nightmare, Matt winces and finds another to focus on.

“Fine, then… Okay, is there anything that everyone thinks about you that isn’t true?”

“What kind of fucking question is that?”

Matt shrugs, feeling less uncomfortable at the vulgarity of Ryan’s response than he might usually, and laxly he thinks, as his body begins to untense, that the alcohol might just be starting to do its job.

“I don’t know. I was just thinking of like, a month ago when we first started hanging out, Chris saw me at church and said some stuff about you. I’m just trying to figure out once and for all if he was really telling the truth or just trying to put me off of being around you.”

Ryan shifts in his seat then, his face a little fallen, seemingly a little uncomfortable that Chris has been brought back into the equation.

“You never told me he talked shit about me to you.”

“You never asked. Plus I thought you might beat me up if I said anything.”

And suddenly Ryan’s smirk is back. “Is that what he told you? That I was going to beat you up?”

“No, he just said that you get into fights at the bar and stuff."

Ryan rolls his eyes, scoffing. “Well, it’s true, I guess, but only sometimes. I try not to make a habit of it. People just piss me off sometimes, it’s not entirely my fault if they provoke me first.” Ryan gestures with a couple outstretched fingers, beckoning the bottle back to his grip, as if the thought makes him want to drink. Matt obliges, passing it along.

“If Chris said anything else about me, that shit is probably true, too, then. What all did he tell you? That I never make the bed? That everyone thinks I’m an asshole? That I’m a piece of shit that doesn’t know how to make friends?”

Matt gazes on at Ryan, a bit astonished, and his ribcage feels like it’s heating up, but it’s not necessarily unpleasant. Another effect of the liquor, he assumes. Or more so hopes, because if it isn’t supposed to feel this way, he should probably get to a doctor soon.

“No, he didn’t say any of that other stuff.”

“Well, it’s all true. I’m don’t make the bed, and I’m definitely a piece of shit, one hundred percent.”

Matt doesn’t mean to gasp- he’s not sure why he does, exactly. But he looks back at Ryan with these knitted brows and asks in this quiet voice his next question of their little game. They’re probably far past twenty by now- it at least feels that way, anyway.

“Why are you so mean to yourself?” Matt asks, something close to a whisper. And Ryan seems to be confused at the question, or more so confused because he really didn’t expect Matt to bring it up. Maybe he thought he could always get away with saying things like that without anyone noticing, because no one had ever cared enough to bother asking before.

Ryan doesn’t answer verbally, just shrugs noncommittally and drinks some more like he’s chasing down his swallow of a bitter answer he doesn’t feel like sharing. Matt lets him get away with the silence, too, because he thinks everyone should be allowed at least some of their secrets to cling to.

The burn of the alcohol has numbed Matt’s throat a little, he notices as he clears his throat, and he accepts Ryan’s pass of the bottle back to him a little more eagerly, now, getting used to the feeling. On the way down, it’s slowly evolving into a thicker, warmer, _sweeter_ trickle down his throat. Between small but incessant sips, he starts to taste the peach a little more beyond the bitterness, and he thinks that, for his first time drinking, this really isn’t so bad. Things could always be worse.

“I’ve got another question for you,” Matt informs, sluggishly turning his head to face Ryan and noticing the nod he receives. His eyes are beginning to feel a little tired, his eyelids heavy, and a yawn escapes him, though he doesn’t even feel all that tired.

“Why exactly were you tagging the church that night?” Ryan scrunches his nose in confusion for a moment, before Matt clarifies, “You know, when you kicked over the trash cans? And then Falcone caught you and everything.”

Ryan shrugs, quiet for a moment or two as though he’s trying to come up with a decent answer. “I don’t really know.” He finally responds, and cracks open another beer, some of the fizz that flows from the top dripping onto the concrete in front of him.

“So that’s it? You just, decided to go there to vandalize a church for fun?” Matt should probably be angry at the way Ryan just nods while shrugging again, but he can’t seem to muster the energy to feel the way his upbringing coerces him to. It’s just spray paint, it should fade within a few years- what harm did Ryan _really_ do, right? If anything, Matt’s _glad_ that he wandered over there that night, because if he hadn’t, Matt might not have totally ratted him out to his father, and they wouldn’t in turn be sitting around getting drunk together, safely slotted beyond the gate of the public pool.

Parts of him wonder if maybe it was Chris- maybe, by going out there that night, Ryan felt he was saying something to him, offending what Chris stood for and hurting him in the process. Anonymously standing up to him in a way that he’s always wanted to, but the way he’s never ever felt strong enough to actually do. And maybe Ryan still doesn’t feel strong enough, judging by the way he talks about Chris. He tells Matt about the mean things Chris would say and do, the way he’d treat Ryan, but when Ryan claims Chris to be an asshole, the opinion seems forced. It seems to Matt like Ryan is almost trying to just convince himself of that, rather than actually fully believing it. Like the way that Matt tells himself that God has a plan for him and he should trust and honor it, yet his heart always feels like it’s somewhere else.

Warmer and warmer, Matt can feel a small, smoldering heat settling just by his rib cage, radiating up through his chest. Suddenly he wonders if he’s going to begin glowing from the inside out. When he leans his head down just to check and make sure, it feels as though he can feel the weight of his brain moving around inside his skull, more of a lull of a slushy mass than a solid, heavy object. Ryan must be able to tell he’s feeling the effects of his drinking, but just before he can get out anything more than a chuckle at Matt’s growing drunkenness, Matt interrupts with a laugh of his own.

And he giggles like he’s never known anything funnier, an eruption of laughter fogging up any other thoughts he might’ve been dwelling on before.

“What the hell is so funny?” Ryan asks with a snicker, as though he can’t help but follow along.

“I’m… I’m drinking. _Drinking_. Do you know how upset my dad would be with me if he found out?”

It’s funny to think how far away from the person he’s supposed to be he is in that moment. It’s _hilarious_ to think of his father, the pastor, still scribbling away at some new sermon in his office, none the wiser that Matt’s soliciting on private property late at night with a bottle of ten dollar liquor and a mean boy named Ryan. Matt has this wide, stretching smile and he giggles as though he can’t help it, then giggles some more.

Until suddenly, it all doesn’t really seem so funny anymore.

“Oh my God... _Ryan_.” The smile drops and his eyes suddenly begin to well with the burn of hot, inexplicable tears. Desperately, he looks to Ryan for some sort of condolence, for some show of comfort that might be just out of his reach.

“I-I’m drinking. What am I _doing?_ ” His words rasp with sullen emotion, this melodramatic despair that he can’t help but feel is situationally appropriate.

The last thing he wants to do is ruin anything or make anyone upset, but somehow, time after time, it always seems to come back around to just that. Matt feels like a screw up, he truly does. What _is_ he doing? With this moment in time, with his _life?_ Disappointment and shame always remain so static and dreadful for him, somehow always just around the corner, waiting for Matt’s next inevitable mistake. He shouldn’t be here, shouldn’t be doing this. He _can’t_ be. Matt stares at his fingers and the way they shake slightly as they curl into loose fists.

Suddenly, Ryan’s figure is stood in front of him, transformed into something of a dark silhouette by the glow of the pool’s lights illuminating the world behind him. Tears trail on Matt’s cheeks, he looks up at Ryan with a slow rise of his heavy, heavy head, and he bets he looks like such an idiot, he bets he looks so _stupid_ right now. How could he possibly have imagined this to be anything but a bad idea?

“I dare you to jump in the pool.” Ryan says simply, and it takes Matt’s sludge-ridden brain a few moments to process the request of him. And then a couple more to figure out why Ryan would ever tell him to do that.

“What?” Matt asks, looking up at Ryan puzzled, helpless, and sniffling.

“You heard me. Go jump in the pool.”

Matt shakes his head at the idea, but not too fast, or he starts to feel just a little sick. “N-No, I’m not gonna do that. That’s so… that’s stupid.”

“I’ll do it if you do.” Ryan says next, as if that would really be all he needs to say so as to finally wrench Matt from his shell and introduce him to the wild and unruly risks of thrill and its complementary fears.

Matt shakes his head again, set on refusal, because maybe he’s been dumb enough this far to drink hand-sanitizer and ask Ryan about his ex, but he’s _not_ going to- and oh, this time, he feels a little more dizzy than sick, and he stops refusing with his shaking head so that he can bow his head down and focus on a small thread that’s loose on his pants. He keeps his eyes trained on it until his head feels a little less fuzzy.

He keeps his eyes still and his head down for so long, in fact, that the only thing that breaks him from his trance is the sound of a splash from the pool’s edge.

“Come on!” Ryan calls to him from the water, and Matt looks up to see his hair weighed and mussed on his forehead, and his jacket and shoes discarded on the abandoned plastic lounge chair. “Jump in already!”

This is stupid, this is so, _so_ stupid. But Matt can’t find it in himself to voice his thoughts and argue any further.

With possibly a bit too much haste, Matt stands to comply, and for some reason, it’s a little difficult to get his feet to go where he wants them to. He manages though, with only a little stumble during the short journey, and he ditches his shoes along with his worries before heading feet-first into the pool.

The first thing he registers is that the water is startlingly cold. Next, that Ryan is suddenly nearby, and lastly, that it seriously is _cold_. With such a humid Californian climate, the last thing he expected was to be met with such a frigid and uninviting experience. Ryan’s hair is slicked back now, away from his brown eyes, and Matt’s own blues lazily search to lock with them until they’re both just grinning and staring at each other, clothes all drenched and heavy, drunk in the middle of the pool. It feels distantly and strangely surreal.

“Dude, you’ve got goosebumps.” Ryan notes, and the way he says it sounds a little different than when Matt speaks, sounds a little more in control and grounded than the lax garbling that Matt can’t help but produce. Ryan moves a little closer then, though, and his leg bumps close to Matt’s under the surface, and now Matt’s not really thinking of what Ryan’s voice sounds like much at all.

His head leans in closer, as if about to whisper Matt another one of his useless secrets that he thinks no one cares to know, but he stoops a little lower so that the cold shell of his ear grazes the skin of Matt’s neck, his forehead resting on Matt’s shoulder. The dizzy feeling, it’s back, and Matt finds that he’s shivering again, too. But suddenly, the water doesn’t feel quite as cold anymore. Ryan’s breath is hitting Matt’s skin in even pattern, like the small waves of chlorinated water that are languidly beginning to even out among them. Ryan laughs, at something that Matt couldn’t possibly begin to guess, and Matt feels that on his skin even more. The vibrations are like tremors that feel much, much closer than they may actually be, like they could be pulsing directly onto Matt’s nerves and into his veins.

“Are you cold or something?” Ryan asks, and he’s a _jerk_ , he’s such a jerk, Matt wants to tell him. But he doesn’t, his mouth feels like it won’t work as it just hangs open, dry and stupid. He just tenses, and Ryan’s head remains resting at the crook of his neck, right where his shoulder begins. Neither of them are moving and it feels like an eternity of just being still together, like the pool has frozen over while they’re in it and they just can’t manage to move.

“The water isn’t even that bad,” Ryan teases in a soft voice, “Why are you shivering?”

Matt doesn’t answer, because he doesn’t think he needs to, because he feels like Ryan knows. And oh no, oh God, he _knows_ ; Matt himself doesn’t even know what Ryan knows, but he does. Of course he does. How could he not?

Matt’s breath hitches next, like it’s caught on something in his throat, caught on some of the unintelligent words he could possibly think to say but can’t find the will to get out. And it’s caught and he’s stuck because Ryan’s lips are chapped and trailing up his neck, now. They’re just dragging all uneven and rigid, just barely, but it’s close enough to feel, to be a touch. It’s _something_. Matt shuts his mouth abruptly, afraid that those messy and blurred thoughts in his head might manage to escape that way if he doesn’t. And he sighs heavily through his nose, because he still can't move in this frozen pool and there's nothing else he can really do.

Ryan travels further, all the way up, rough mouth touching in fleeting points across Matt’s jaw until he's hovering just in front of him, their foreheads almost touching and lips so close, but without contact. Matt's eyes move frantically, now, still dizzy and unsure of if this is real, if this should really be this _real_ to him. He’s looking at the faint freckles on Ryan’s cheeks that he can see better up close, and the water droplets in Ryan’s beard, and the scabbed over teeth marks on Ryan's lips. Ryan's eyes are so lidded they’re nearly closed. They both just sit there, the water still around them, just like them, frozen in time, suspended in the pool. Matt's feet touch the bottom but he could swear that he's floating.

Suddenly, there’s a break, a stitch in the moment of Ryan’s even breaths hitting Matt’s own scared lips, where Ryan flinches a little as Matt finally whispers, "What are we doing?" A single rational thought amongst a messy sea of others.

He’s losing his balance though, and leaning in more as the words escape him. Maybe he’s contradicting himself and his actions, going against his words. Maybe he is. Matt's heart beats wildly but everything else is so heavy and slow- his own heartbeat is too erratic for this flat and motionless moment they're stuck in. Ryan is silent still until Matt finally looks up from where he's been staring with such hooded eyes. Has he really been transfixed for so long, just gazing at Ryan’s parted lips, dry and rosy pink? When did that come to be?

Ryan is looking back at him, now, and he asks simply, in this smooth sort of voice that’s brisk and deep and low, "Well, what are we _about_ to do?”

Neither answer the other’s questions as Ryan leans in to kiss him, and Matt definitely and wholly _lets_ him.

Matt tastes a residual flavor of chlorine on Ryan’s mouth, and he can faintly smell the familiar cigarette smoke that tends to cling to him. It’s not what all of the movies have told him it’s supposed to be, though. Matt feels like he’s focusing more on keeping his eyes screwed shut tightly than feeling anything exhilarating, and in reality the butterflies he thinks he can feel may be the bad mix of alcohol taking a turn for the worse in his gut. It’s not terrible, but he can’t say that it’s anything special. It’s maybe the most gentle movement Matt’s ever known Ryan to make, that tender space in between them where their lips meet so slight and soft, but what is it beyond just a touch? It registers briefly in Matt’s groggy state of mind that it’s something along the lines of passion that must be the element that’s missing.

And suddenly, after his mind reels enough to run circles around his furiously pounding heart, he wonders: why is he looking for passion in someone like _Ryan?_ Why is he letting this happen?

What the hell is he doing?

Matt breaks free, backs away with a frantic jerk, and there’s a soft smack of where his lips leave Ryan’s, and a slosh of water as the glowing pool moves around him. The water isn’t frozen, and time is moving again. As he stares at Ryan and tries desperately to make his vision just a little less wobbly and his thoughts a little less jumbled, Matt thinks that he really, truly, just can’t find it in himself to stick around and deal with this. Instead, he chooses to flee, because what else is a coward meant to do when they’re scared?

Clambering through the pool, a slow and tedious wade, Matt blinks and blinks, the dizziness unceasing as he tells Ryan, “I-I’m going to- I have to go. I’m gonna-,”

He doesn’t finish his thought as he reaches the edge, fumbling and shaky hands clinging to the slippery chill of the ladder. A nearby pool light shines in his eyes, and everything, seriously _everything_ , feels like just too much right now. Fresh out of the water, Matt sits kneeling on the ground for a moment, eyes searching in quick, fluttering movements for his shoes, and where did they _go_ , where the hell did he put them?

“Matt,” Ryan says, suddenly behind him, his voice so calm and even that Matt actually takes a moment to turn and stare up at him from his hunched position on the concrete, because how can he manage to sound like that after what they’ve just done? And how did he get out of the water so fast?

“You had too much to drink, you can’t walk all the way home on your own.”

Matt hears him, sure he does, but he looks away again and doesn’t acknowledge those untroubled words in that easygoing tone, because he doesn’t care, and _where_ in the world did he put his shoes? Scared and defiant, Matt begins to stand, ignoring whatever Ryan starts to say to him next, because he’s not in the mood to hear it, and because his stomach is all of a sudden starting to fight his flustered and fumbled movements. It lurches sickeningly at the overzealous way he takes too-large of steps that only sometimes land where he was aiming, and maybe Ryan’s right, maybe he just can’t make it all the way back to his house, over all the hills and the twisting roads and-

“Jesus, Matt, you look bad. Are you gonna be sick?” Ryan asks next, followed by a quieter and exasperated, “I _told_ you to take things slow.” Matt can’t find a better way to respond other than with a shake of his head, his vision dancing in winding waves that don’t do much to ease his building nausea.

“I just want to go home,” Matt admits feebly, drunk and upset as dirty pool water drips from the hair that clings to his forehead into his eyes and off the tip of his nose. Although Ryan is possibly the last person he’d like to accept help from in this moment, when Matt looks over at him again, he now has Matt’s shoes in his hand. Matt isn’t sure there’s much else he can do at this point other than admit defeat, and desperately try not to vomit, or cry. Whichever would come first.

The effects of the alcohol are strange and upsetting to Matt- his warm and happy euphoria has vanished, replaced by an urge to just lie down and wait for the night to end and his mind to revert back to normal. And it’s _scary_ how things seem to be fading in and out of their own accord, absolutely out of his control. One moment he’s being all but heaved towards the pool’s gated entrance, and the next he’s walking down some dark road while gravel digs into his feet through his wet socks, unable to remember how exactly he made it back over the fence.

It’s so unnerving to feel so beyond helpless. It feels like his brain is giving up on him, like he’s sleepwalking while still awake. All he knows is that Ryan’s next to him, and they’re making headway toward somewhere, and the dizziness has subsided whilst the worry takes over his autopilot for a little while.

The last thing Matt really recalls is being led into a bedroom that’s not his own, and gracelessly letting himself fall onto a messy and unmade bed.

\--

Matt’s never actually been grounded before, because he so very rarely will do anything wrong- it’s so unlike him to bother getting into trouble that’s not worth his time, trouble that wouldn’t do anything for him other than make his parents mad and blackout a few of his irretrievable late-night memories. This, though, he thinks, and dwells on it the very moment he wakes up, _this_ will surely land him a sentence of grounding for something close to the rest of his entire adult life.

He wakes up slowly to the sight of an unfamiliar room, head on a pillow with no pillow case, taking in the clothes strewn on the floor and a set of blinds with pieces of the slats missing. Terror quickly overcomes him in an aggressive haze as Matt realizes that, wherever this is, it’s not home. He sits up fast enough to make his head hurt, though he notes that it doesn’t hurt in the way it did the night before. This feels nothing like his dizzy and regrettable decision; this time, his head pounds with panic.

There’s no shirt on his back, for some reason that he’s pitifully struggling to remember, and goosebumps rise to his skin, though the air in the room is humid and the sun streaming through the broken faux wooden blinds is invitingly warm. It’s only a few moments more before Matt decides to try his luck in calming the reeling of his mind, and after his breathing manages to slow just a bit, he becomes aware soon after the start of his slight hysteria that he must only be in Ryan’s house, in his room that’s always remained just along the hallway he’s never ventured down. Unsurprisingly enough, however, knowing where he is doesn’t manage to do all that much to slow the racing speed of his heart.

Matt scrambles to leave the unfamiliar bed, shoving the linen he’s beginning to sweat under off of his body in a rush. And he’s so ready to just leave all of the night of stupid choices behind him, to escape the house he shouldn’t be in, whether fully dressed or not. He just can’t ever seem to get where he wants to go lately without first running into more trouble.

“Whoa, hey,” Ryan fumbles after Matt nearly crashes into him in the middle of the doorway, seeming as though he’s trying to grasp for the right words to say in this uncomfortable scenario. Matt stares at him with his eyes still a little blurred from his heavy sleep, and tries to focus his gaze.

“I, uh, I thought I heard you moving around down here.”

“Yeah.” Matt says shortly, and his voice is a little croaky. Is he supposed to sound this hoarse?

“I’m going to go home, my dad is probably so mad at me right now.”

“That’s- yeah, okay. I hung your clothes to dry outside, I’ll just. I’ll go grab them for you. Wait here.”

Ryan catches his eye just before he disappears from the doorway, and Matt feels unplaceable discomfort beginning to rise from somewhere in him, settling tensely in the muscles of his shoulders. Maybe he doesn’t remember all that much of getting to Ryan’s bedroom, but he remembers all _too_ much of what all went down before that, before the alcohol scorched his brain into numbness and inactivity. And it’s still unnerving to know that there are things that, no matter how tightly he screws his eyes shut and tries to recollect, he just can’t place them- but he almost wishes that he just couldn’t remember anything at all.

“Here.” Ryan causes Matt to jump, having interrupted his scope of Ryan’s lonely and junk-filled bedroom. Matt tears his eyes from a mess of old pictures that are situated on a nightstand, covered in dust like they haven't been touched in awhile, or have more rather long been forgotten.

Ryan gives Matt the space he needs to change out of the pair of worn sweatpants he’d unknowingly borrowed, but he trails after him to the front door once he’s done. He keeps this firm and unnerving gaze trained on Matt, something in the dark brown of his eyes appearing distantly desperate and frenzied. It’s as though his eyes are letting on and speaking out all of his thoughts, loose notions that he’s still storing inside because he’s used to keeping them locked away. Matt doesn’t keep looking back long enough to figure it out, whatever _it_ is that Ryan clearly wants to say but is holding back. He’s in a hurry, and the time that’s endlessly slipping away from him isn’t going to be well-used in an attempt to try and decipher Ryan’s unreadable gaze.

“Can we hang out? Later, I mean?” Ryan asks with rushed words, calling after Matt who’s already halfway to the street. And what a strange feeling it is, to know that he’s managed to finally gain something from Ryan, to know once and for all that their time spent together isn’t convenience or coincidence, but all deliberate choice. He’s _asking_ to see Matt for once, instead of just showing up at the church unannounced, or just opening his door wordlessly when Matt stops by. It _should_ feel empowering, should leave Matt feeling successful in his efforts to make something of a hollow and dry beginning with someone so erratic. But he only needs to get home, and right now, those words of Ryan’s don’t feel anything except obstructing.

Despite the twist of his stomach and the way his hands just barely start to sweat, Matt swallows, blinks, and nods his head. Any other words die between them as he shoves his hands in his pockets and makes his way towards a certain inevitable Hell that he suspects is waiting for him at home. He hopes his father isn’t too mad.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i understand that i am a little untimely with updating sometimes but BLEASE if you comment, let it be some useful feedback or thoughts rather than just asking for an update! don't get me wrong, i love the enthusiasm for the fic and that you want chapters sooner, but i promise i won't just leave y'all hanging, i intend on finishing this story. thx for the patience, drop a like and rate 5 stars, thx <3


	5. Seethe and Settle

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> maybe i should rename this fic "rollercoaster" bc it really is just up and down all the time, huh?
> 
> sum visuals for the river  
> [x](https://prairierivers.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/image1-768x564.jpeg) [x](https://chicagotonight.wttw.com/sites/default/files/field/image/Chicago%20River_0.jpg)
> 
> the awful ms paint gallery  
> [ryan's house](https://ibb.co/fWqXsp)  
> [the church](https://ibb.co/i7AAdU)  
> [entire town map](https://ibb.co/hNirk9)

Matt lies. He lies so cleanly and directly to his father’s face, and he can’t tell what’s scarier- how natural the false words sound as he speaks them, or the way that, after he faces an obligatory lecture, there’s nothing even close to guilt that he can feel dwelling in him afterwards. He thinks he should feel guilty, for running off on private property, for being dishonest, for _something_ \- but the feeling doesn’t come.

It’s seamless, the way he explains that he had only stayed the night with Chris, that he hadn’t been out all night but been with someone responsible. To his fortune, too, the pastor buys it even more easily than he had spouted it. With no real anger or consequences, Matt isn’t forced into the responsibility of what he’d done. With having gotten off the hook, however, or having never been hooked in the first place, Matt thinks that turning right back around to Ryan so soon isn’t in his best interest. It comes to mind, sure, Ryan’s request to see him soon, but Matt already feels drained from the effort of putting on a facade for his father, and he doesn’t think heading to Ryan’s place and sinking into his deep-set sofa cushions will ease his exhaustion at all. Not when all he can think about is how he’s upset with the choices he made for himself at the pool, and when all of those choices involved Ryan.

Too lost just brooding over the things he wishes didn’t even happen, Matt allows himself ample time to cool down. Time to float away from the stiffness the chlorine left in his clothes, the smell of it, and away from the thick, warm taste of bitter peach still biting forwardly in his memory.

He initially plans to give himself just one day, but doesn’t think that it hurts much of anything as the hours go by and the single day eventually turns into two. If he isn’t avoiding spending time with Ryan, though, then he’s lingering around his father. And the more time he spends in the chapel or at home with his parents at the dinner table, the more this steep feeling of dread gradually edges its way into his chest with each passing moment. He realizes on that second day in the evening, sat impatiently in a pew with the Lord as his witness, that oh, _there’s_ the guilt.

If it’s not guilt, then it’s something similar, some other heavy feeling of worry that Matt doesn’t feel like placing, for fear of making it too real.

His mind just keeps tumbling the same stale thoughts around in his head, and Matt wants someone to talk to, someone other than his parents. Maybe that’d help lift this feeling and make his head feel less clouded. Mainly, he just needs a walk to refresh his head, to let the air dust away the rigidity of his self-isolation. He’s just walking- and if he ends up somewhere specific, it’s of the accord of his own two feet, with a mind of their own practicing a familiar journey.

Matt shows up unannounced to Ryan’s place on a Saturday, late into the sunny afternoon, but Ryan opens the door on the second knock like he’s been expecting him all day.

They haven’t ever exactly spent official, unadulterated time together in the dingy house just for the purpose of recreation, and now that it’s happening, Matt feels fidgety. They share few and quiet words with each other, and agree to take advantage of the hoarded collection of DVDs Ryan keeps strewn around in unkempt stacks amongst his living room. Matt’s never heard of this film that starts buzzing on the screen, so he can’t really find any interest in paying attention to it.

But this is better than sitting alone at home with the preacher or with his own thoughts- isn’t it?

When Ryan settles down onto the sofa next to Matt’s stiff posture, Matt makes sure to conspicuously shuffle far away. His is side pressed to the nearly threadbare arm of the couch, more protruding baseboard than padding. It’s uncomfortable, but he doesn’t care. Ryan is looking over, with a stare that Matt can feel but will not meet, but he doesn't say anything. They keep up their mutual silence for an entire twenty minutes into the movie, just up until Matt changes the cross of his legs again for an innumerable time. Ryan exhales frustratedly and turns to Matt, fully and explicitly demanding his attention.

“Look, if you don't want to be here, then you can just go. No one is forcing you to pretend to want to hang out with me.”

“I’m not pretending.” Matt says, with a nonchalant raise of his hand, in this gesture that says something like, “Sure, I want to be here, don't be an idiot.” His unfocused eyes are still trained forward to the screen that he's not watching.

Ryan moves a little closer, and Matt grimaces as he makes sure to not turn to Ryan, to just eye him out of his peripheral vision. He can see Ryan looking towards his hands that are placed back in his lap, his fingers chasing each other nervously, twisting in an uncomfortable fidget. It’s when Ryan reaches for him that Matt breaks his streak and flips his head to Ryan with a jolt.

“What happened to your hand?” Ryan asks curiously, so apparently unaware of how Matt could not wish to be any further away from him in this moment. Matt jerks his hand away from Ryan’s outstretched grip before he can make contact, and he glances to the small line of red on the delicate skin on the back of his hand. One look at it has him feeling frustrated, as if he really needs another reminder.

“I scratched it on the gate to the pool.” Matt answers in this numb and distant tone, and now he’s regretting not taking Ryan up on his offer of leaving the one place he’d rather not be and hightailing it back home to relative safety.

It’s so quiet then, and Matt is cradling the scrape as if it’ll cover it up in his brain, too. _It_ \- that thing, what he let happen, what God must be enraged with him for, what has struck him with this perpetually nauseous feeling right in the pit of his stomach for days now. He sits there, trying to find the guts to actually make himself get up and go to the door, avoiding confronting what’s troubling him. Despite his disinterest in discussing it, this inner turmoil is all he can focus on.

“So… are we going to talk about it?” Ryan asks, voice unreadably even. Something about that frustrates Matt, but he does his best to reciprocate the indifference in his own wavering words.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” He lies.

Ryan scoffs, and of _course_ they’re already here again, already back to the root of everything between them. Back to the raised voices and aggravation that never seems to fully leave, but rather always looms somewhere nearby until it’s invited back in again.

“You clearly do. Every time I’m within five feet of touching you, you flinch away like I’m gonna burn you or something.”

Matt’s resolve to stay composed is dwindling quickly, slipping from his clammy, twisting fingers. “Can we not do this, please?” He asks, hoping the politeness of his request will assure Ryan that he’s serious, that this is the last thing he wants to be dealing with right now.

“You can’t keep pretending it didn’t happen, because guess what? It did! We kissed, now get the fuck over it.”

“I’m just- I don’t know, okay? I don’t know what to think, but I don’t… I just don’t feel good about it.” He admits with a strong start, and a small and vulnerable finish. His abruptly feeble tone is a challenge to Ryan’s own aggressive one, and he hopes, maybe fruitlessly so, that it’ll do something to dissipate at least some of the static tension that lies stubbornly between them. It comes as an afterthought, almost uncontrollable as he adds with the same resigned quietness, “I can’t believe you did this to me.”

And with that, it’s almost a sealed and locked in fate, that the strain and tension between them will never truly be alleviated.

“What the hell are you talking about? I didn’t even do anything for once, _what_ are you talking about.”

“You made me kiss you! Why would you do that?” Matt exclaims, bursting out of his subdued state with his voice high-pitched and his finger pointing accusingly at Ryan. The outburst feels out of character and unexpected, but not necessarily unwelcome.

“Why the fuck are you saying this is _my_ fault? You knew what you were doing!”

“ _No_ , I didn’t, Ryan, I _didn’t_. You got me drunk, and you knew I could do something stupid. Why didn’t you stop me?”

Ryan stands, as if to flee from the accusations. Good, Matt thinks, his breathing now picked up as he exhales heavily through his nose. Walk away because you know it’s true. The breaks between the lashes are so serene in their silence, and the air is still aside from Ryan’s pacing. They know that the calm isn’t ever going to last.

“I just seriously don’t get why this is even a big deal. It’s not like it _meant_ anything, I mean, you said it yourself, we were both drunk.” Ryan says, laughing a dry, incredulous laugh. He faces back to Matt, who’s sat so taut and inwardly fuming still on the sagging wreck of the sofa. His fingers finally still when Ryan asks next, “Is this _really_ because I’m a guy?”

Ryan locks eyes with Matt, and stares, his expression warping as he must see something that Matt is trying desperately not to convey.

“It is, isn’t it? Are you really still convinced you can’t be religious and like dudes? You’re barely even a Christian at this point anyway, Matt!”

“What is that supposed to mean?” Matt asks, drawing his eyebrows together because he can’t decide on being offended or confused.

“Well, let’s see, you’ve vandalized things, you broke into the pool with me, you got drunk while trespassing, you’ve basically helped me steal stuff- do I need to keep going? I mean, you’re probably going to stop going to church next! Just fucking get _over_ yourself already. Stop acting like you’re too fucking _innocent_ for this.”

Matt shakes a little and imagines the unbearable scenario of his father confronting him for missing a service, imagines the scowl the preacher would have, and imagines what his own face would look like as he tells his dad that he just isn’t feeling God’s love anymore, maybe never even was. It hurts, and it _scares_ him. All he’s ever really known is his religion, relying on it to guide him and shape him into a person instead of doing it all on his own. The theoretical scene plays and plays in his head; his mom being upset, his imaginary eyes narrowed the way Ryan’s are right now, and- _no_.

Maybe the person he’s imagining looks like himself, but it isn’t him. That’s a different Matt that he can’t and won’t reach. This is all Ryan’s fault, he decides right then, for barging in and convincing Matt that he doesn’t have to follow anyone’s rules except his own, for being such an awful influence. It’s all his fault.

“No,” Matt declares, standing, advancing towards Ryan so that he’s there, so close in front of him again, except now he’s only here to force him away.

“It’s not because you’re a guy. It’s because it’s _you_.”

His words are a forced and awful excuse. Of _course_ it’s because Ryan’s a boy, because it’s been all but drilled in his head that the church accepts everyone, but that the preacher and God himself can’t stand a man with another man. It’s scary to trust that God can and will punish Matt for who he kisses, and the more he dwells on it, the more afraid he becomes for his future as a Christian. Maybe Ryan was wrong about all of his sins contradicting his faith, but something like this may very well condemn him, may change who he is- won’t it?

He can’t just admit that out loud though, especially not to someone like Ryan. Religious aspect aside, it seems just _mean_ to tell Ryan that he’s wrong for living this way, when he’s never once denied his relationship with Chris, his sexuality, or tried making excuses for it.

There are thoughts that spring to mind that have Matt wondering if this really has to do with the Bible’s teachings at all, considering how easy it was to accept Ryan having a history with Chris. Matt manages to keep the deliberation brief, though- or more rather, just pushes the thoughts away. This is what he’s telling himself. This is the right way to think. This is how God would rather him behave.

There’s this growing twinge of pain that’s spreading right around his heart, tight and uncomfortably warm, _wrenching_ \- it’s the feeling of knowing that he’s about to spout a lie. His own brain is growing confused with the interrupted transmission between his thoughts and his speech, his tongue moving as if nothing at all can stop it. Matt is stuck between his excuses for himself and the will to do the right thing, and maybe, from the very beginning, he really always has been.

Ryan is stunned into silence for once, though Matt feels nothing but sick at the look of disbelief on Ryan’s face. There’s this deep, monotonous inquiry he asks after he swallows, voice croaky and tight, “What do you mean?” Matt is so aware that there’s no sense in him asking, because he knows, he must know what Matt’s implying. But Matt can’t help but indulge him.

“I mean that it’s _you._ You’re a jerk! You’re an _asshole_! And-,” He falters, catching his breath, wracking his brain for the correct words to make it hurt just right. He thinks the use of a curse word he might otherwise never say has done its job if Ryan’s expression is anything to go by.

Matt’s eyes flit around the room, searching for something. A way out? A fleeting chance at redemption? They find something else, though. They find something better. Matt marches to an end table, feeling like he’s bound to tear up any moment now, though it’s so awfully and frustratingly unclear why. Probably because this isn’t his honest answer to Ryan’s question; probably because he’s learning quickly that it never feels any better to wrestle out a parade of lies.

“You’re a _drug addict_ .” He says, holding up a bag for Ryan to see that he wishes neither of them could recognize, before flinging it down on the carpet in front of Ryan’s feet. “I’m not even supposed to hang out with people like you! So why the hell would I _kiss_ someone like you, either?”

Ryan fumes, his calmly sedated and level trance shattered all the way through. His words, however, remain scarily just as monotonous and smooth as before.

“You don’t get to judge my fucking decisions. You don’t know what it’s _like_ to be lonely, to want something different, to want to _be_ someone different. Your precious God isn't going to save me- this is what real life is like, that is what real people turn to.” Ryan shakes his head, an unhappy half smile appearing crookedly on his face, “But you wouldn't know that, huh, living in some fucking fairy tale where everything is handed to you and nothing ever goes wrong.”

“Whatever,” Matt mumbles, drained, defeated. Maybe because he’s knowing of his faults and his mistakes, and because he knows that there’s truth in Ryan’s words. He’s regretful. Ashamed of how he tried to tear Ryan apart to cover up his own insecurities, only for them both to lose in the end.

He shakes his head and manages one last quip before heading out the door, hand holding onto the doorknob that’s missing a screw, scuffed and loose and wobbly.

“Just- don’t ever kiss me again, okay?”

It’s commanding and cold, so unbelievably far from Matt’s usual and expected demeanor. Ryan, however, hardly misses a beat as he replies, just as stonily, “Wouldn’t dream of it.” Matt feels like he should slam the door, but instead, he closes it softly and slowly behind him.

\--

The easiest way to deal with conflict, Matt has come to realize, is to pretend as though everything is fine. When Matt departs from a bland and monotonous church service the following Sunday through the church doors, and sees a familiar figure sitting on the curb of the street corner nearby, he knows his first instinct would typically be to head in the other direction, to avoid confrontation and reroute. Instead of finding an easy out, though, today Matt approaches Ryan’s slouched frame almost confidently, his legs carrying him by their own volition, and squints at the light of the afternoon sun that shines mercilessly warm on his face.

“My mom used to tell me not to sit on the curb because my feet could get run over.” Matt says, as if to no one in particular, looking at the housing developments across the street rather than down at Ryan.

Without so much as even a flinch or a look back at the source of the voice, Ryan snaps back in a mumbled sort of monotone, “Maybe I want to get run over.”

The strange interaction serves as a greeting and a tense truce all in one, and from there they head on their way. No more words are shared, save for Ryan’s quick grumble that he needs to buy more cigarettes, and there’s no mention of their heated exchange from just yesterday, either. Distantly, a thought that he’s choosing to push away and ignore, Matt thinks that it should be odd that they’re ignoring what they should be addressing, acting as though the fiery argument and hurtful words never happened. It’s preferable, sure, having the stupid statements he made the mistake of saying be disregarded. But as Matt walks along in the silence between them, he recalls this line from his mother, and can’t stop thinking about it during the entire trek down the street: pretending that nothing is wrong is only going to make things worse.

Matt follows aimlessly for a few blocks, while along the way his brain swaps between looking for something, anything he could say to break this settled silence between them, and just wishing Ryan would say something first. It gets unbearable at a certain point though, both this act of pretending to be friendly, and acting like this voluntary quiet is ordinary and _fine_. Matt can’t shake the unsettling feeling of the realization of either of these things, but he only bothers to act on the latter.

“So, where are we going, anyway?” He asks Ryan, who’s just a few paces ahead of him in a cap that’s pulled down low to cover his eyes.

In a half-grumbled but completely patronizing tone, Ryan replies back, lazily with a slight look over his shoulder, “Wouldn’t you like to know?” And for a countless time, Matt just rolls his eyes at himself, at what he keeps getting himself into, and wonders why he even bothers spending time with Ryan at all.

They do eventually make it to a destination, despite a small belief Matt had been harboring that he was trailing behind Ryan lost puppy-style all afternoon for nothing. When Ryan stops in front of a rundown building just a little ways past downtown, Matt is unimpressed, and mostly just wondering why Ryan seems to be so interested in these abandoned holes left to rot.

“The old Winn Dixie? Should I even ask why we’re here?”

“No one really bothers heading this way anymore, that’s why. Plus it has a lot of long brick walls, which is perfect for what we’re doing.”

“What _are_ we doing?” Matt asks, only because with a real answer, he can decide on whether he should actually stick around or not.

Ryan slips off the strap of the backpack he’s been carrying, then, and unzips it to reveal several cans of spray paint, much to Matt’s distaste. He can’t say that it’s the absolute _worst_ way to spend the warm summer day, but there are still much more favorable things he can think of to do. Almost anything other than spraying curse words along the walls of a deserted grocery store, really.

Remarkably, however, Matt doesn’t decline the less-than tempting offer and turn around back home, because, when he thinks about it, what’s waiting for him there, anyway? He may be at an odd standpoint with Ryan lately, but he bets that this Winn Dixie will feel a hell of a lot more comforting than yet another day spent wasted inside the church’s same boring walls, or alone in his bedroom at home with no one around to keep him company.

He tries to keep his expression mostly blank, then shrugs at Ryan in response, posing the silent question, “Well, why not?”

Except this isn’t really Matt’s scene- at all. Ryan has slowly but surely been guiding him down some irreversible delinquent’s path, introducing him to all sorts of ways to rebel against his father. This however, is the first thing that Matt thinks he could actually face consequences for- or rather, the first harrowing thing that they’re doing in broad daylight. It’s off-putting, to say the least, and Matt attempts to express his concerns to Ryan, whether he’s willing to listen or not.

“I don’t really think we should be doing this.” Matt admits, and he just _waits_ for Ryan to turn and look at him like he’s a buzzkill, the church kid that can’t ever learn to live a little and just drags everyone else down. Matt assumes that it’s all that Ryan’s thought of him this whole time, anyway, but that with the rare thrill of a new face and a new friend, Matt hasn’t been able to realize it during the entire month’s time. He just waits for Ryan to give him that look. Then he’ll know if he’s really wanted here at all.

Ryan does dramatically turn his head towards Matt, and lets out this huff of a sigh, but he doesn’t narrow his eyes at him in that way Matt’s become accustomed to, not this time. While Matt doesn’t _like_ the attitude per se, he at least appreciates that he’s not being lectured on how bland and boring his lifestyle is. At least not today.

“This building just sits here, it’s not in use anymore. What other purpose could it possibly have than for people to put whatever they want all over it?”

“I don’t _know_ , I just know that this is, like… illegal, isn’t it? I mean, tagging buildings is the whole reason we’re even talking to each other at all, remember?”

Ryan waves his hand nonchalantly as he says, “Whatever, it’s different when the place is abandoned like this. I mean, look at it- other people have already drawn all over it, so I take that as a sign that we can do it to.”

As much as he wholly disagrees with that logic - he definitely thinks of his mother asking him if he’d join his friends in jumping off a bridge - Matt can tell that Ryan isn’t going to be swayed and will end up using the can of spray paint he’s shaking no matter what Matt tries to counter with. At this point, Matt can either just watch in disapproval as Ryan does what he wants, or opt in for himself. And he can’t really see why he wouldn’t join in if he’s going to watch it all go down, anyway. He’s technically an accomplice either way, right?

Matt doesn’t know what he’s doing, but he goes in like he does, boldly spraying a wobbly, dripping strip of black paint along a patch of masonry that hasn’t yet been defiled. Then he just stares at it, as if trying to understand what to make of it like an abstract painting at an art gallery. The sun is shining warm on the back of his neck, but his cheeks feel warmer as he embarrassingly admits to Ryan, “Okay, I don’t even know what to write.” As if Ryan couldn’t already tell.

“Just, I don’t know, write your initials or something.” Ryan offers without looking up from his own creation. Matt looks over to see that he’s even using two different colors. He never would have pegged Ryan as the artistic type, but it involves two of his favorite things- crime, and abandoned buildings. It only makes sense this sort of activity would be the perfect match.

“Won’t that make it obvious that I’m the one who did it, though?” Matt asks unsurely, cheeks still blazing with the tight sunburn of embarrassment. No matter what they venture to do, Matt manages to find a way to make himself look like a complete loser. It’s a mystery as to when it started even _mattering_ what Ryan thought of him, anyway, but Matt doesn’t feel like bothering trying to figure it out.

That’s enough to have Ryan lowering his own can and walking the short distance over to Matt’s solitary and pathetic black line, all lonely and stark on the sun-baked wall. He locks eyes with Matt for a minute, and they seem to share this silent debate of, “Are you kidding me?” and “I don’t know what I’m doing here, give me a break.”

“What’s your last name, Matt?” Ryan finally asks with an unimpressed raise of his eyebrows.

“Watson.”

“Right, so how many M.W.s do you think there are in this town? How could anyone _possibly_ know it’s you?”

“I- Well, I guess a lot, but. I don’t know, I’m just paranoid, okay? What did _you_ write, anyway?”

Ryan seems stuck between trying to appear unabashedly proud of his work and a little hesitant to have Matt take a look. It’s probably safe to assume this is the first time he’s ever had someone along while tagging a building, and the first time someone’s been present to actually judge his creation.

Matt paces over to the spot Ryan had previously been slightly hunched in front of, stares for a moment, and finally turns back to Ryan with an eyebrow raised in a questioning glance.

“What the heck is ‘Rynohazard?’” He asks, a little suspiciously, hoping it’s not some obscene innuendo that he’s too sheltered to have been aware of.

“It’s like- Some guys used to call me that in high school. It’s a nickname, sort of.”

Matt may be the very last person that’s able to judge whether something or someone else is _cool_ or not, but he can’t help but feel like the name is nerdy and weird and everything Ryan seems to try not to be. It’s not in his nature to laugh and make fun of other people, but when the beginnings of a smile tug at the corners of his mouth, he just can’t seem to hold it in.

He laughs a little as he says, “That’s… so dumb.”

His day wasn’t supposed to go this way at all; he wasn’t supposed to try vandalizing things with the one person he can’t ever seem to properly appease. He wasn’t even supposed to really even _speak_ to Ryan again if he didn’t have to- at least, that’s what he’d been telling himself. But when Ryan cracks a smile back, and shoves at Matt’s shoulder while muttering a lighthearted, “Shut up,” it doesn’t seem like this afternoon could have or should have gone any differently than this. A heap of tension dissipates between them right then. Whether Ryan had felt it or not, Matt’s still unsure, but he at least knows that he himself feels better.

A quick joke and a couple of laughs don’t feel like they’re enough, though. Matt may be one to silence himself around his father, and when he doesn’t agree with what’s being spoken about in church, but with Ryan, he doesn’t think he can continue to act as though nothing at all has shifted between them.

“Look,” Matt begins, his easygoing chuckles dying down as he takes on a quieter, more somber tone. His eyes are averted down to the cracked asphalt, staring at his shoe that’s scraping a few bits of gravel around mindlessly.

“I’m sorry about the other day. I just-,”

“Forget it,” Ryan instantly responds back, almost automatically, almost as if that’s the line that he’s said a thousand times before Matt, to other people that he also shielded his feelings from. But that’s just it- those other friends, other faces, Matt is not them. They might’ve taken Ryan’s quick and monotonous gloss-over as an easy out, but Matt isn’t going to let it be that way, not this time.

With a shake of his head, he begins again, more firmly this time, “No, really. I know I was acting really stupid about it all, you just- you have to give me a break. I’m not used to things being so… _different_ like that, and I don’t hate you or anything, I just didn’t have anyone else to blame. Well… I did, but I didn’t want to admit that it was my fault for getting drunk in the first place.” He’s not sure if he’s really making sense, but he hadn’t previously planned or thought out any kind of coherent apology, so he hopes that Ryan just gets what he’s trying to say.

“And you’re right,” He continues as an afterthought, though it should have been what he started with, “I don’t know what it’s like to be in the situation you’re in. I know you’re not, uh… not not a bad person, not _really_. So I can’t judge your decisions.”

Ryan doesn’t say anything, and doesn’t look like he’s planning to, either. He mostly just stares at the colorful wall of the Winn Dixie beside them, as though he’s searching for something to say amongst all of the painted words and pictures. Or maybe that’s not it at all, Matt thinks, his mind rolling over countless thoughts as he tries to process this version of Ryan’s scowl. Maybe Ryan knows exactly what he’d like to say, but he’s not sure how, or if he wants to say it at all.

He finally looks back at Matt, with his eyes hard and focused but seemingly a little less dark than usual. They make eye contact, and for some reason, Matt feels tense and subconsciously holds his breath, hoping he hasn’t said the wrong thing again.

Finally, with the smallest and faintest traces of a smile, Ryan shakes his head a little as he says, “It’s cool. Don’t worry about it.”

And while Matt can’t be entirely sure that he’s alleviated all of the strain on their friendship, he can at least find a little solace in Ryan accepting his apology. The sun is still lingering high in the sky of the early afternoon, and Matt thinks that this might be the perfect day to possibly gain a little respect from Ryan, even if he’s not completely comfortable with the methods of getting there.

“So, now that we’re done with _that_ , do you want to go do something else?”

\--

“Are you sure you’re really up for this?” Ryan asks Matt disbelievingly, narrowing his eyes skeptically as Matt makes quick work of untying his shoes. He goes as far as to fold his socks neatly and place them in his sneakers, but soon sees Ryan’s classic, “Are you kidding me?” look and finds that he’s embarrassing himself again without even realizing it.

“Yeah, I mean- yes. Sure. Why not?” Matt’s voice doesn’t sound as wobbly as he thought it might’ve, but his hands are shaking just a little. Still, his body’s reaction doesn’t change his decision. It’s true that he’s committing to this decently stupid idea for fear of making a fool out of himself again if he doesn’t, but he’s tired of always backing down.

“Well, maybe because you were being a total bitch about it last time. I don’t care if you don’t want to. It’s not like I haven’t done it alone before.”

On a regular day, with almost anyone other than Ryan, Matt would take advantage of Ryan’s apathy as an opportunity to flee. He feels like he has something to prove, though. To himself, to Ryan, or both, he’s not completely certain, but he’s opting for ignoring the slight inner turmoil and saving the self-searching for another time. Right now, he needs to focus on collecting the nerve to jump off of a bridge.

The best way to go about this, Matt thinks to himself while he absently runs his hands along the cement railing, is to _not_ think. It’s a little hard for someone like him, who often relies on and is left with nothing _but_ his own thoughts. He just knows that if there’s any hope in ever free-falling the 12 or so feet down and splashing into the murky water of the river, he has to try and let himself just _be_ for once.

It also probably helps that Ryan jumps first.

“Fucking do it already!” Ryan calls to him from the water below, squinting up at Matt kneeling on the railing of the bridge, with his shirt still done up all the way to the top button. Matt’s never really been afraid of heights, or water, or swimming, so he’s not sure _why_ he’s so apprehensive. And the more he thinks about it, the more it frustrates him that he always has to think things through, instead of just listening to Ryan’s annoyed shouts for him to jump. So he goes for it.

He slowly rises off of his knees, until he’s full standing on wobbly legs and overlooking the expanse of the river that he can see until it curves around trees too tall to see past. In the moment, he’s tempted to look behind him, to see if he can get a view of the church from up here, to feel as though he’s jumping _away_ from it. But he loses his balance before he can, and Matt plummets into the water below. The sound of cars driving nearby and a plane above and all the buzzing cicadas vanish into a rush of water in his ears and bubbles breaking his fall.

When he surfaces, he looks at Ryan a few feet away from him, and initially feels the pull of dread nagging at his insides. But this isn’t like the pool, and the more he kicks his feet, his clothes feeling strange against his body under the water, the more the dread fades away. Eventually, he’s left with just bits of adrenaline and a smile, his feet just a bit too far from the riverbed to touch. Matt feels like all of the kids in the teen summer movies he’d watch at home that he always wished he could be

His daydream is cut a little short when Ryan splashes some of the greenish-brown water at him from a little ways away. When Matt whips his head around to stare after Ryan with a surprised glare, he doesn’t think he’s ever seen Ryan smiling so wide. He isn’t sure what it is, but he thinks he gets the way Ryan’s feeling, as he splashes him back. It’s something about the slow movement of the tepid water and the sun that brightly warms his cheeks that has everything washed in a gentle feeling of contentment. Ryan seems to give up on their battle before its begun in favor floating on his back instead, his eyes slipping closed peacefully.

A whole month ago, Matt couldn’t have pictured himself doing anything even close to this, couldn’t picture much of _anything_ outside of the church’s walls or his bedroom door. Despite that, though, Matt is here; treading water while one of his good shirts gets possibly irrevocably stained by some river water that feels more refreshing than any HOA pool he’s ever splashed in. And he’s _smiling_. He doesn’t know what in him changed, or if he’s even changed at all- maybe he was always meant to live like this, just barely beyond the death grip of the church and his father but feeling remarkably and stupidly free.

This doesn’t feel like he had a place in things ending up this way, though. A strong pull feels as though he should believe that this was all God’s doing. Matt feels detached from the church right then, the most he’s ever felt, all while the sun shines incessantly and reflects off the water into his crinkled eyes. Yet still he thinks, as Ryan floats languidly nearby wearing his t-shirt and a content, involuntary expression, that if God _is_ the reason for his happiness now and the path he’s currently on, it’s because He always meant for Matt to find Ryan. And he found him.

“Matt? Hello?” Ryan’s voice breaks the trance of reflection he was in, and suddenly, Matt’s train of thought has never seemed quite so silly. Ryan can’t know what he was thinking about, but he feels embarrassed by where his mind had wandered, anyway. He blinks away the remnants of what he imagined to be a revelation, but what must’ve just been the summer haze dousing him in misplaced euphoria and melting his brain into an inarticulate slush. Matt recovers relatively easily, and tunes back into the world around him.

“I think there’s mud in my shorts, and I definitely saw a snake a couple seconds ago. I don’t know about you, but I’m getting out.”

Since when has Matt ever been anything other than a follower?

They both make their way to the bank of the river, their clothes heavy and soaked but their spirits defiantly weightless. At least Matt’s is- he can only hope that Ryan is feeling the cliché teenage summer dream as much as he is. They’re about ready to head back up to the bridge, Matt hoping most of all that some passerby haven’t seen and snatched his shoes sitting abandoned on the walkway, before Ryan stops and points something out to him amongst the overly green and abundant foliage.

“Dude, look.” He says, his finger outstretched in the direction of a bush nearby. At first glance, it seems to be nothing special, but after looking closer within the leaves, Matt’s able to see a collection of black and red berries nestled amongst the green.

“Blackberries?” Matt asks unsurely, skeptical of if they should pick them, let alone eat them. Maybe he just isn’t accustomed to this sort of thing, having never gone camping in his life or even strayed too far off the walking trails in the park, but Ryan seems to be all for it. He tugs one free from the branch it’s clinging to, and offers it over to Matt, drops of water still dripping from his sopping hair to his forehead.

“Just try it.” Ryan assures him, and, with little reason to say no, Matt obliges. He chews slowly at first, unknowingly harboring some internalized fear of eating anything that doesn’t come from his mother’s own garden in their fenced-in backyard. His doubt is quickly wiped away, however, when the juice of the berry rolls over his tongue, and when he swallows, he realizes he’s left wanting more.

“That’s pretty good.”

“Told you. I guess we can hang out here for a bit.” Ryan says, shrugging to himself, before beginning to pick handfuls of the fruit at a time, pulling the hem of his shirt up and placing them in the makeshift basket.

Matt is a little grossed out that they haven’t even washed their hands after being in the river water, but doubts that he could get away with saying anything about it without Ryan’s eyes rolling back in his head in annoyance. He keeps his mouth shut, because he’s more keen on just savoring the moment without ruining it in some way, as he almost always seems to do, and starts to pick some berries of his own. They both eventually make their way closer to the bank again, sitting amongst some tree roots with the juice from the berries staining their fingertips. Ryan dips just his feet in the water from where they sit, and Matt has never found it more simple to just have an easy conversation with Ryan before the river.

After an hour or more of drawn-out, aimless chatting, Matt and Ryan are both quiet on the river bank. They sit there together until the small pile of wild blackberries has diminished. And they haven’t said a word for nearly twenty minutes now, but Matt feels an inexplicable urge to just apologize. When he looks at the river that flows so calmly that it nearly just sits, it seems as though that the things he’s done and said to make Ryan upset weigh more heavily on him than they ever have.

Despite the want to, Matt doesn’t tell Ryan he’s sorry, because he doesn’t know what good it would do them now. After a genuine bout of moments like these, it seems as though bringing up the things that Matt has said in slight anger and in fear of his own emotions would only bring them both back down to reality. The sun’s bright shine on everything is too serene for them to remember that things are imperfect, between them and between everything. Matt can’t be sure what Ryan is thinking, but he hopes that they can at least inwardly be somewhat on the same page for once as they watch the day slowly go by.

Matt can’t place why, but within the shared silence, his mind starts to wander, thinking about what he is to others. He wonders if his parents even bother to question where it is he goes off to anymore, or if they’ve always wanted him out of their hair, anyway, and can’t be bothered to care. He wonders if Chris ever truly considered him a friend the way Matt did with him, or if he was more so someone that just wouldn’t stay out of his way. He wonders if Ryan feels the same way as all of the others might, if he considers Matt an accomplice out of habit more than someone he can rely on and trust. Matt wonders if God is listening to him now, and if he can hear him. If he’s even there, why not give Matt just a shred of reassurance to make him feel better?

He waits for something miraculous, but the river keeps moving at its own pace, and the clouds don’t seem in any hurry to change their shape. Maybe all this worrying is for nothing, but he can never be sure.

“It’s getting late, I think I’m going to head back before we get covered in bug bites.” Ryan announces, and just like that, Matt feels awake again, less dazed in a trance of self-doubt.

And when has he - so unsure of himself, of his meaning to others, of anything other than his already dubious faith that seems to fall away from him more and more each day - when has _Matt_ ever been anything less than a follower?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> （ ´_⊃｀）<\--- this is jeremy. he's kinda sad bc he's hungry. he only eats comments tho, so leave one to feed jeremy and make him happy again. this has been a psa, thank you.


	6. Petals

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i really think this is my favorite chapter. as excited as some of you say you are to see what happens next, i'm just as excited to post these to see everyone's reactions. 
> 
> if you squint, you can see that i've added a chapter limit.... sry to say that things will wrap up in chapter 9. thanks for sticking with it so far. luv u *smooch*
> 
> the awful ms paint gallery  
> [ryan's house](https://ibb.co/fWqXsp)  
> [the church](https://ibb.co/i7AAdU)  
> [entire town map](https://ibb.co/hNirk9)

If he’s being honest, Matt can’t say that he’s surprised things turned out this way. He’s more so just surprised that Ryan didn’t see this coming.

It started when Ryan walked through the double doors of the church one day, of course checking with Matt the day before that his father wouldn’t be around to kick him out. It was later in the evening, and although Matt wasn’t doing anything worthwhile as he lazed around the pews, he still somehow missed the sound of rainfall that had began to pick up outside. It was definitely made harder to miss though, when Ryan entered dripping wet, bringing half the storm in with him.

Right then, it didn’t seem like too big of a deal. Mostly, because Matt was too busy trying to haphazardly and anxiously mop up Ryan’s puddles with an old acolyte robe to wonder why Ryan bothered walking in the rain. Now, though, standing in the doorway of Ryan’s house and staring sympathetically and a little disgustedly at the mess that Ryan is on his own living room couch, Matt gets why his mom tells him not to stay out in the rain.

“You look…” Matt begins to say, but figures he shouldn’t finish the sentence if he doesn’t want to worsen Ryan’s mood any further. Instead, with a grimace that he can’t help, Matt closes the door behind him and pads over to Ryan, avoiding the balled-up tissues that are scattered like a trail of breadcrumbs along the way. Despite not completely voicing his thoughts, Ryan seems to know exactly what he’s thinking. Ryan rolls his eyes at him when Matt awkwardly half-crouches in front of Ryan’s crumpled form on the couch.

“I know. Don’t make me cough on you.”

Matt heeds the warning, and stands up straight again so that he’s hopefully less within the radius for germs. It’s probably just a little cold that Ryan’s got, but he doesn’t seem as though he’s handling it well at all. The bags under his eyes are more pronounced than usual, and his nose is a little red from its constant running and all the tissues. Matt knows that if Ryan wasn’t so exhausted, he would object to Matt being around at all, because he doesn’t often like to be made vulnerable and for anyone to see him at his lowest. Right now, though, it doesn’t seem like he’s up for doing much of anything besides laying there on the couch with a pitiful look on his face, his eyes half-closed and his long hair a mess on the cushions.

“Shouldn’t you go to the doctor?” Matt asks, uncertain of if such a question counts as overstepping his boundaries. He can never be too sure with Ryan, no matter how much time they increasingly end up spending together.

At that, Ryan shifts a little on the couch, and lazily drapes his arm over his eyes so that his face is buried in his elbow. He sighs before saying, “Why would I go to the doctor?”

“Because you’re sick,” Matt replies, like it’s obvious. Because it is. He’ll never understand why Ryan makes such simple interactions into something bigger than they need to be, throwing around a bad attitude as if just to be difficult and to frustrate Matt.

“Yeah, no shit. But I’m not going to a fucking doctor for it. I’ll probably be better by tomorrow, it’s not a big deal.”

“You probably caught something in the rain, though. Stuff like that can be more serious, right? I think? I don’t know, maybe you should just get a check-up or something just in case.” Matt argues back almost mindlessly. It’s as if Ryan has instilled some of his argumentative nature in him during the time they’ve been friends, because he surely wouldn’t normally bite back so quickly about something so trivial, let alone even care as much in the first place. Regardless, he can’t seem to help the way his mouth works before his brain can fully register what he’s doing, trying to talk sense into one of the most stubborn people he’s ever met. Ryan’s probably right, it’ll pass in a couple days at least- so why does Matt keep bothering to insist?

“Matt,” Ryan says, arm placed over his eyes so that Matt can’t fully see his expression, though he can tell by the tone of his voice that he’s getting frustrated. He sounds about as stern as he can with being as congested and exhausted as he is.

“I don’t need medicine or some shit, okay? I don’t trust doctors anyway.”

“But what if it just gets _worse_ -,”

“Can you just fucking drop it? I don’t- we’re not all born into well-off families, alright? My _loving family_ isn’t going to pay for my doctor’s visit, and unless _you_ are, I’m not going. End of discussion.”

He spits out the words with such disdain- _loving family_. Matt knows that he’s taking a jab at Matt’s lifestyle, the sheltered way he was raised and the sheltered way everything still is. It’s not the first time Ryan’s said something rude about it, and Matt doesn’t blame him for being annoyed with his clean-cut Christian upbringing. Matt isn’t mad at him for having very reasonably placed feelings about it all, and especially not when he’s under the weather like this. It’s hard not to dwell on it though, because Matt’s less focused on whatever half-hearted insults Ryan was trying to hurl at him, and more curious about the deeper meaning behind Ryan’s words.

Ryan hasn’t ever mentioned much about his family or his home life. He talked briefly about friends from his childhood, people he’d spend time with in high school, and his relationship with Chris. He’d also mentioned more than once how he doesn’t see any of them anymore, and how most, if not all, of them have left him behind. None of that had anything to do with parents or family matters, though, so Matt can only guess that they too have since abandoned Ryan.

Matt knows it’s not his place to know or pry, so he doesn’t dare ever question him about it, but he can’t help but wonder what the story is behind Ryan’s relationship with his family. Judging by the way he never mentions them, save for less-than subtle implications like right now, Matt makes a quick assumption that it isn’t a very nice story. And that he likely doesn’t want to talk about it.

“Okay, okay,” Matt says, shoving his hands in his front pockets submissively and easing his tone before Ryan gets too worked up, “I get it. No doctor.”

Ryan doesn’t say anything else, just lays still, breathing through his open mouth. Matt sighs, and figures that since he’s already here, he can’t just leave Ryan to suffer through his cold alone, whether he brought it upon himself or not. He may not seem to be up for cooperating, but that’s no challenge that Matt hasn’t faced before.

“Can I at least, like, get you something? Do you have cold medicine in the house already?”

“...No,” Ryan mumbles back after a pause, as if trying to remember himself. At the realization that it’s a negative, his voice comes out quietly, weakly.

“Okay, well, I’m going to go buy some then.” Matt says definitively, although he leaves a pause for Ryan’s objection that he’s sure will follow. Miraculously, there isn’t a vexed sigh that he gets in return, just more seconds of silence. He can’t be sure if Ryan’s frustrated by Matt’s persistence and is purposefully ignoring him, or if he’s actually just fallen asleep. Either way, he plans on dropping by the drug store that isn’t too far from Ryan’s place anyway, because the nagging words of his parents are in his head, urging him to take care of those who need it. And if Ryan isn’t going to take care of himself, than who else is going to do it for him but Matt?

He heads back towards the door, grateful that the sun is mostly hidden by the clouds today so that the walk to the drugstore won’t be _too_ awful and sweaty. Matt realizes that Ryan apparently isn’t sleeping, though, when he mutters something as Matt is ready to reach for the doorknob again, voice still just as low and lethargic.

“Buy some soup too.” He tacks on, sounding a little more hopefully questioning than demanding, though it could just be Matt’s imagination.

“Fine,” Matt says, in a tone that sounds as though he couldn’t really care, as though he isn’t going to comply with Ryan’s wishes and take care of him, anyway.

When Ryan’s front door falls shut behind him, and Matt sets off under a mostly cloudy sky in search of some cold medicine, he’s got some time to think. Sometimes, he figures it’s the last thing he needs- to be plagued by the same recurring thoughts day after day, still wondering what the hell to do with them, and what the right way to feel is. But whether he wants it to or not, his mind wanders. It wanders the whole way to the nearest drug store- as he’s passing the strip with the eye doctor and the dry cleaners, and when he rounds the corner so that he’s near the bust stop and the collection of newspaper stands. There are other people about, as the weather is finally something in between boiling hot and pouring rain, and cars rushing by on the roads.

In a world full of endless distractions, Matt still thinks about Ryan.

All his life, Matt has never had someone around that he can call his best friend. It wouldn’t be such a stupidly prominent fact, either, if it weren’t for the memory of mentioning it to his mother one time, asking for help. He told her he couldn’t tell if it was a bad thing, if because most other kids he knew had someone so close to them then it could mean that there was something wrong with him. Most times, when Matt would remember the way she told him, “God will always be your friend,” it would make him feel a little better. Today, though, as he walks into the drugstore’s rush of air conditioning, he feels like rolling his eyes at the thought.

Matt feels silly for jumping to labels and advice from his mom when really, it’s not that big of a deal. The very basis of it is that Matt can feel himself getting attached, and although it doesn’t exactly scare him, he still feels unsure of what to do with that realization. He can’t help but think of the way Ryan addressed him when the first met, how he told Matt that once the summer was over, they wouldn’t see each other again. Things have, of course, panned out a little differently than he expected them to, and Matt can only consider that the same is true for Ryan. So that would mean that any previous statements made don’t exactly apply anymore, right? That Ryan surely wouldn’t _actually_ want to leave Matt hanging out to dry after a summer like this, right?

Matt isn’t ever too sure of a lot of things, and Ryan is the furthest from an exception. He can’t know what the end of the summer will look like for him, and it dawns on him suddenly how close it is, standing in the middle of the medication aisle of a drugstore in mid-July. In an attempt to keep himself from expecting the worst, Matt starts to scan the over-the-counter cold medications meticulously, looking for anything that says “fast-acting” and “multi-symptom.” With summer already halfway over, he knows that dwelling on the fact will only make him worry more than he already does.

After picking up the medication and finding one of the two types of soup the place offers, and being surprised that it carries any at all, Matt makes his way over to the the cashier, the only person aside from him in the otherwise empty store. She seems desperate for some human interaction, and starts up a conversation as soon as he’s stood at the counter.

"Oh that soup is great, you'll like it", She tells him, smiling politely at maybe one of the only customers she’s seen all day. Matt tries to focus less on how generic chicken noodle soup could really be that great, and more on courteously responding back.

"Oh, no," Matt finds himself saying, the words finding their way out of his mouth as if of their own accord, "It's actually for my-,” and then he pauses. Matt stops in the middle of the sentence, snaps his mouth back shut, and decides it's better left unfinished.

Because how the hell is he _supposed_ to finish that?

It’s for his _what?_ That boy that’s back sleeping on the couch looking so miserable that Matt can’t help but pity him? The one he kissed the one time, the one he spends nearly all of his time with, the one that’s become the definition of summer for Matt in only a month and a half? Does that count as a best friend, or would it be too glorifying to give Ryan such a title, when their relationship often seems so much more complicated than that?

The girl at the counter looks at him confusedly, and rightfully so- but he suddenly feels too afraid to wonder what he was going to end up saying. She finishes by ringing up the box of cold medicine next, giving Matt strange sideways glances every couple of seconds, as if she’s questioning his silence, trying to process what’s going on. Matt wishes he knew, too.

After he’s handed her the little bit of cash in his pocket and is out the door, able to flee from the situation, his brain kicks into overdrive. It’s trying to make sense of the bulk of his feelings about Ryan again, only this time, it’s worse. Matt’s grip on the flimsy plastic bag in his hand is tighter than he realizes as he walks down the sidewalk and just thinks. He thinks about how he first felt too afraid to even look Ryan in the eye, yet now he willingly lets himself get _drunk_ around Ryan, finds himself feeling that he might just tell Ryan anything he wanted to know if he asked. The person he felt reluctant to even spend an hour a week with is now someone he knows better than he knows almost anyone else, and Matt doesn’t know what to do with that information.

He runs over it all as he makes his way back to him. There’s all these useless facts, like that Matt knows in his handwriting, Ryan loops the letter G, but not the letter Y. He knows that Ryan prefers taking baths to showers, which Matt likes to tease him about. He knows that Ryan likes the smell of the rain on asphalt, and that he’s creeped out by frogs, and that he ties his shoes with two bunny ears rather than just one. Matt knows all these things that he _knows_ shouldn’t matter much, it shouldn’t feel like such a heavy, tangible _thing_ to realize that Ryan has become the best friend that God could never be.

Yet, it does. And all those little facts seem more special than useless to Matt.

When Matt arrives back at Ryan’s place, he enters quietly and shuts the door softly behind him. The last thing he wants is to wake him when rest is probably one of the best medicines for him right now. He’s quickly let known that Ryan wasn’t sleeping at all, though, when a groggy and only slightly croaky voice sounds from his slumped and tired figure that’s still pressed into the couch.

“Took you long enough.”

Just like most times, Matt all but ignores the attitude, feeling less bothered by it than he likely should.

“I just got generic stuff, I hope that’s okay.” Matt announces, placing the plastic bag he’s carried home on the kitchen counter as he goes to find something for Ryan to drink in the cupboards. He feels a bit like a mother taking care of a sick child, and laughs a little to himself at the thought.

“What’s funny?” Ryan asks, lifting his head only slightly from the sofa cushions and peering over the back of the couch, as if just to prove that he’s still alive.

“Nothing, I just figured you’d be asleep by now.”

“I’m too congested to sleep right now. It fucking sucks.”

Matt rolls his eyes at Ryan’s language, and paces back over to the living room with a cup of water and cold medicine in hand.

“Then sit up so you can take this, it should help you feel better.”

When Ryan, always so stubborn, actually does as he’s told without much of a fight, Matt realizes then just how awful he must actually be feeling. And it’s not as though Ryan is ever in a much better mood than he is now, always loaded with some sarcastic remark or a roll of his eyes, but Matt still hopes that this doesn’t last for long. Seeing someone he cares about in a state of distress like this, however mild, only causes Matt’s heart to grow that little bit heavier.

Ryan doesn’t actually object once for the rest of the night, let alone say much at all. Matt was planning on heading to the farmer’s market again and asking to come along, but now he’s settling for just staying inside with the companionship of Ryan’s TV. He seems tired more than anything else, which isn’t something too out of the ordinary; Matt figures he just must be able to feel it more when his body is worn down like this.

A little bit later on, when the day is giving way to the early evening, Matt looks over to Ryan for the first time in a while. He’d turned on the TV for some background noise, but Matt had become almost entranced by the same news stories on a repeating loop for the past hour or so, and almost forgot he wasn’t at home. When he turns away from the screen, blinking a few times in a row to focus his eyes, Matt finds that Ryan is all but passed out on the couch, sitting upright but leaned back into the cushions in a position that looks less than comfortable. Good, Matt thinks. It’s about time he let himself relax for once.

“Ryan?” He asks, to double check that Ryan’s actually out cold. Ryan stirs a little, but his mouth still hangs open with sleep, and he doesn’t verbally respond to Matt’s call. As much as Matt doesn’t want to wake him, the more he looks at the way that he’s sleeping, the more he entertains the idea of maybe just having Ryan open his eyes enough to make it to his bedroom, where hopefully he can sleep in a way that won’t cause his neck to ache so much in the morning.

“Ryan,” Matt says again, a little louder, now. He stands from the armchair he’d been zoned out on and moves towards Ryan’s relaxed figure. It’s not uncommon for Ryan to be ill-tempered in general, so Matt hopes that waking him like this won’t result in any mean comments or rude remarks.

A hand reaches out to shake Ryan’s shoulder, gently at first, but a little more forceful as it proves to be necessary. He’s in such a deep sleep that Matt starts to feel a little too guilty about attempting to move him. However, he doesn’t get a chance to contemplate backing out of the idea, because Ryan’s eyes begin to peel open soon enough, and Matt has to face him.

“ _What?_ ” Ryan asks, still not fully awake. Matt guesses that it was supposed to sound a little more intimidating than that, but the word came out in mostly a sleepy, congested whisper that Matt can’t help but smirk at.

“You should move to your room, you’re going to get a neck cramp sleeping like that.”

“Fine, whatever will make you stop _shoving_ me like that.”

And Matt knows that he’s supposed to be frustrated with Ryan for being annoyed with him. He’s only trying to help, and he’s met with this awful attitude that really, when he thinks about it, hasn’t ever fully went away. Matt still smiles a little helplessly, though, at the way that Ryan all but falls off the couch as he rolls over, lazily planting his feet on the ground and walking as though his legs are heavier than usual, harder to lug around. It’s endearing to him, all of it. All of Ryan.

He figures it best to stay put and not wander into Ryan’s bedroom, because as much as he wishes Ryan would properly appreciate the help he’s offering, he knows it can all feel a little overbearing. It must come from the way Matt’s own mom used to smother him, too, sometimes rushing him to the doctor for nothing more than a migraine. He should let Ryan relax, and leave the cold medicine to hopefully do its job. He should stop worrying about the unopened can of soup, or if Ryan has enough tissues in the house, or if he has a fever. He should let himself out. He should go.

Yet, he still stands there in the living room, looking down the short hallway as if waiting for Ryan to emerge from his bedroom and come back into view.

He’ll just check to see that Ryan made it to bed without collapsing on the floor dramatically out of laziness. That won’t do any harm, and he’ll leave soon after, to stop treating Ryan like a thing that needs to be all cradled and protected and looked after. Because that isn’t Ryan, it’s so far from it.

Isn’t it?

Matt treads lightly down the hall, knowing that the floorboards must creak- he just isn’t sure which ones. An intrusive thought crosses his mind then, wiggles its way in so that Matt is suddenly thinking of how, if he spent enough time here, he could figure it out for himself. If he made his way to Ryan’s bedroom enough times, he’d know which parts of the floor would let Ryan know that he’s here. He shakes his head at himself nearly as soon as the notion comes, as if that’ll shake away all those thoughts that spring up without warning. It’s not like he can control them, or thinks of these things on his own.

The door to Ryan’s room is halfway open, looking as though Ryan haphazardly shoved it open enough to clamber inside and fall onto the mattress a few steps in. Thankfully, that’s where Matt sees him, too, in a position that looks less than comfortable, sprawled out on the bed with his leg hanging halfway off the side. His face is pressed part of the way into his pillow with his mouth hanging open, and Matt can’t help cracking a smile at the face of Ryan in a deep sleep like this. Maybe it’s because he always tends to look so somber, or annoyed, or like he’d rather be anywhere other than where he is. Like this, he’s transparent. Sloppy and sleepy and drooling a little onto his pillowcase, but without barriers. Matt thinks he likes him like this.

Something compels Matt to come in a little closer, just to make sure of… something. Maybe that Ryan’s head is propped up enough so that he can breathe okay, or that he isn’t going to fall off the bed in his sleep. If Ryan were to wake up and wondering why Matt is sitting on the end of his bed looking at him, he’d tell him something like that. For now though, he just sits.

It’s been lurking in the back of his mind all afternoon, but now, it’s crept to the forefront again. He can’t stop thinking about what he said at the drugstore, or rather started to say, but didn’t. It doesn’t scare him, per se, or make him feel as though he should distance himself from Ryan. But if it doesn’t scare him, then why is his heart rate starting to pick up?

Maybe it’s the fear of the unknown. That’s always been one of Matt’s biggest weaknesses, and why he was always so compelled to be involved in the church. If he didn’t worship God, then what would he do on judgement day? If he didn’t listen to his parents, then who would look out for him in this world? Matt feels as uneasy thinking about how much he cares about Ryan as he does when his father tells him he’ll be punished for his sins. Matt doesn’t want to think of what it would feel like to know that Ryan doesn’t like being around him as much as Matt does with him.

Matt stays sitting there, as stiff as the cheap mattress he’s placed on, and he looks around the room, as if trying to find something else to focus on. The clock he hadn’t even noticed the last time he was unknowingly and unwillingly lead to this room is ticking, and the more his ears tune into that fact the more it sounds as though the ticking is growing louder and louder. The end of the summer feels like a judgement day all on its own, and he realizes right then how much he doesn’t want to lose Ryan.

He didn’t know he could become attached to someone like this, or the way they make him feel. Maybe it’s even as simple as the fact that Matt actually leaves the house and the church now, skipping out on his monotonous routine and his dad’s watchful eye to do something different and _be_ with someone different. If, at the end of all of this, Matt finds out his friendship has been for nothing, and Ryan was only in it for his own selfish gain, he doesn’t know what he’ll do. What would he have been doing wrong? And who would he turn to after that?

A feeling edges over him then, starting pricklingly tense at his shoulders until his whole body seems so rigid with it. The clock is still the loudest sound in the room, heard over Ryan’s breathing, and Matt feels like he shouldn’t be in here at all. Like it’s unnatural, and that Ryan would want him gone.

Yet it also feels like it’s exactly where he needs to be all at the same time.

Quickly, then, Matt decides that he’s spent enough time around Ryan for today, or maybe for longer, and realizes it’s time to go. Maybe that’s all he needs- a break from so many long, hot hours around the same person. Maybe it’s his own fault that he’s become so dependent on someone and their company like this.

Though, on the walk back home that seems even longer than usual, Matt can’t recall another friendship ever feeling like this one.

\--

“What? Why not?” Ryan asks incredulously in the early evening later in the week, feeling much better than just a few days prior. Matt is glad that he’s well again, even if it’s mostly so that he can get a break from Ryan’s constant complaining. There’s still a few sniffles here and there, but Matt quickly realized that Ryan didn’t want to be teased about it. Still, he keeps the thought in mind that he’s glad he was able to be Ryan’s cold medicine-bearing savior.

The sun is going down now, and the orange of the sky’s vivid sunset matches the glow of the cherry on Ryan’s cigarette. The hand that isn’t bringing the thing to his lips is in his pocket, and Ryan has an agitated, questioning expression aimed directly at Matt.

They were meant to be heading back to Ryan’s place to finish watching _The Sandlot_ , which Matt had somehow never been allowed to see. Matt’s curfew had cut the movie short the day before, and Ryan was insistent that Matt needed to watch it all the way through. He also insisted, though, that no movie night was really complete without a decent supply of alcohol, and mentioned making a detour at the liquor store before returning to the house. Matt was, somehow, not in agreement with the plan.

“Really? Do you not remember the last time I drank?” Matt asks with a roll of his eyes.

“I never said _you_ were going to drink. Besides, even if you were a total fucking mess-,”

“Hey! I wasn’t even that bad, don’t be a jerk.”

“You were almost in tears because you couldn’t find your shoes.”

Matt responds with silence, because he can’t really recall that memory, and figures that fact alone speaks for itself.

“ _Anyway_ ,” Ryan persists, taking a drag from his cigarette between his words, and Matt watches its smoke float off into the humid air. He notes that it looks unfitting against the rosy-orange sky.

“Even though you can’t handle your alcohol, I wouldn’t let you get like that again. If you even wanted to drink, _which_ , I knew you wouldn’t. So I don’t get why me getting plastered is such a problem for you.”

Matt’s eyes wander back over to stare at Ryan, his mouth parted to convey how just how little fun he’s having with this conversation, and how dumbfounded he is as to how Ryan can’t see why.

“Because even if I’ve only been around someone who’s drunk one time before, I know that I don’t want to do it again. It’s not really ideal for me to have to look after someone who can’t even keep their words straight.”

“You don’t give me enough credit. Not everyone gets fucked up from a single beer like you do.”

“You keep saying that like it was _my_ idea to go drinking! You’re right, maybe I’m not giving you enough credit, since _you_ made me get all stupid like that in the first place.”

Matt feels frustrated and his cheeks a little hot, unsure of why Ryan’s so insistent on blaming that whole night on Matt’s inability to hold his alcohol. Shouldn’t he of all people have known that someone like Matt wouldn’t be able to take it well?

Ryan, however, doesn’t seem to reciprocate Matt’s feeling of rising anger at all. And when Matt stares at him for a few seconds longer, he even realizes that Ryan is _smiling_. Smirking around the cigarette between his lips, looking smug and sure of himself, giving Matt this knowing stare that Matt doesn’t quite know how to interpret. Fortunately, or maybe rather unfortunately, Ryan exhales, letting smoke flow out of his nose and mouth, and lets Matt in on his little secret.

“You’re afraid I’m gonna kiss you again, aren’t you?”

Matt splutters, his mind reeling, the smell of smoke suddenly seeming overwhelming, and blinking too much as he tries as hard as he can to not let onto Ryan how right he is. He shakes his head, wondering why, of all things, Ryan had to bring up _this_ \- and also, Matt wonders why he feels himself caring so much about it at all.

“What? No! I didn’t even- is it so bad to not want to be the only person who’s sober?”

 “Guess not,” Ryan says, but he’s still grinning. He looks pleased with himself. Matt looks towards him so as not to make it so obvious how put off he is by their topic of conversation, but focuses more on the burning end of Ryan’s cigarette that’s tucked between his lips rather than looking directly at him or in his eyes. He can practically feel the stare Ryan’s giving him as he sucks on his cigarette and draws smoke into his lungs, but he tries not to let his resolve drain away. The last thing he needs is for Ryan to know that he’s won.

 They walk along in a shared silence for a block or so then, Ryan still looking a little too proud of himself and Matt feeling so conflicted by the way his heart is reacting to the memory of the night in the pool. If he’s honest, he doesn’t remember all that much of after they both jumped in, recalling it in a choppy sequence of events rather than a smooth memory. The water was chilly enough to startle him, they both said things that Matt can’t remember, Ryan was there, and then Ryan was _there_ , kissing him. He got out of the pool and apparently made off to Ryan’s house, but that part feels even less like a memory and more like a vague and fuzzy dream.

The more he thinks about it all though, the more he wonders if it really _would_ be so bad to spend time around a drunk Ryan again. If the worst thing that happened was an intoxicated kiss instead of anything illegal, then why _is_ he so strung out thinking about it?

It’s his dad. And the church, and God. And the way all the things he feels like he shouldn’t be doing keep conflicting with his heart that urges him to do them anyway. He doesn’t want to kiss Ryan again, he _doesn’t_.

But he does think that some alcohol will make Ryan lighten up a little, and that definitely couldn’t hurt anything.

“Okay,” Matt says in defeat, grateful that he doesn’t have to hold his breath during their wordless journey anymore.

“Okay what?”

“You’re right, it doesn’t make sense for me to not want to go if I’m not going to be the one drinking. So… okay. I’m fine with going.”

Ryan gives him this smile, this real, genuine one, however small it may be. To Matt, it doesn’t seem sarcastic or toying or smug. It’s rare for Ryan to look so at ease and defenseless for once, and Matt’s realizing that he doesn’t know what to do about it.

“But you have to buy me some candy to make up for it.” He says, talking just to talk, saying something that might make Ryan stop looking at him in a way that makes his stomach lurch in jolts. Thankfully, Matt’s silent pleading to God to give his brain a break from all this wondering and wandering through pliant emotions seems to have been heard, as Ryan turns to look back ahead after only a few seconds of locked eyes with Matt. Matt really wants to know what he’s thinking.

“I can settle with that.”

\--

Matt’s never been inside of a liquor store, or even ever been too close to one. He’s not sure why he’s nervous to step inside, but something about it makes him feel as though someone like himself just doesn’t really belong. He’s already hassled Ryan enough today, though, and he figures that putting up yet another fight about it will only waste both of their time. They can get in and get out quickly if he complies, especially since Ryan seems to be familiar with the place, seems to know what he’s doing. It’s just like any other store- it’s not as though the place will be littered with alcoholics and drug dealers just because it’s a little further back into the more run-down side of town.

There’s no bell that rings above their head as they walk in, which Ryan mentions quietly to him is because some local “rebellious teenagers” stole the thing awhile back. A flier warning of neighborhood crimes is taped to the inside of the window, but it looks worn and faded as though it’s been there for a while. Matt bets it’s mostly just a liability thing. He also wonders why anyone would care enough to steal a lousy bell.

It seems normal enough inside, like any other store lit by nearly overbearing fluorescent lights and a blinking open sign. The only difference that Matt can really spot is that, instead of normal things like batteries and magazines to buy, all the shelves are lined with bottles of alcohol and cases of beer. That, and there’s a very intoxicated man arguing with the cashier up front. Matt definitely notices that right away.

His mom always told him no to stare at strangers in public, so he tries his best to keep his eyes averted, following Ryan, who seems to know his way around the store, to one of the aisles. The few choice words he hears the drunk spewing let on that he’s definitely too drunk to allow the purchase of more alcohol, which the very fed-up man behind the counter continues to tell him. Matt already knew that drinking and drunk people were very much not his thing, but hearing this interaction go down is definitely solidifying that for him. He tunes out the mostly one-sided and sloppy exchange by attempting to make conversation with Ryan. About the one thing that he couldn’t be less knowledgeable about.

“Wait, is that just lemonade?”

“Yeah, but with alcohol. I only drink straight liquor when I want to get drunk quicker.”

Matt cocks his head to the side just slightly, a little confused. “Don’t you want always want to get drunk quick, though? Isn’t that the point?”

“No, not really. I don’t want to get wasted tonight, I just want something to take the edge off.”

Right, that makes sense to Matt… sort of. He’s ready to ask for some clarification, maybe question what it is exactly has given Ryan “an edge” in the first place, before his train of thought is interrupted. He’s quickly tuned back into the babbling voice of the old man he’d tried to block out, because now, it’s right behind him.

“What’re you homos doing, huh?” He asks, and Matt hates how undeniably fast the word paints him with warm embarrassment, stinging in a way that he can too clearly place. Mostly, he just hopes that Ryan doesn’t get upset by it, figuring that he must have been the subject of awful remarks like that, and probably much worse, in the past.

Matt turns part of the way around to get a glimpse at the guy with frayed grey hair that’s half gone, staring he and Ryan down with an unfocused gaze that still manages to be just too far on the side of harsh and judgemental.

Ryan, Matt notices, doesn’t look up at all, and just continues staring straight ahead at the alcohol on the shelves as though he hasn’t noticed that he’s there. The man is on the other end of the small aisle a fair distance away, yet Matt still feels increasingly claustrophobic the longer that he lingers there. He hopes Ryan will figure out what he wants soon so that they can leave and can be free from the scrutinizing gaze of this stranger in a liquor store.

It just so happens, though, that it’s not as soon as Matt would like.

“Gettin’ fucked up before you… before you suck each others dicks, aren’t you?” The man continues, his speech erratic and uneven, as though he forgets that has a point after every few words.

Matt turns to Ryan with a distressed look in his eye that he hopes conveys all it needs to, because he doesn’t want to say anything that would goad this guy on any further. While he knows, somewhere in his subconscious, that some intoxicated, wandering man in his late fifties must be a nuisance at best and mostly harmless, his stomach still churns with building uneasiness. Because he’s never been the victim of harassment like this before, and the feeling of fearing for his own safety is an unpleasant one at best.

The fact that Ryan remains silent and unbothered by it all also doesn’t really help Matt’s anxiety one bit.

“Bet that’s the only way you can fuck each other, fucking disgusting.”

Matt’s hands begin to grow clammy as he sees the man start to shuffle forward unsteadily, thinking the unnerving thought that if he were to try to lash out out of spite, Ryan might just end up leaving him behind to run on his own. Is this what Ryan has to deal with all the time? Is this why Chris never let anyone know that he was seeing another boy?

The biggest wash of relief floods over Matt as Ryan finally looks up from where he’s been contemplating his purchase, as if that’s what really deserves his attention right now. He holds the alcohol in his right hand, and in his left, grabs ahold of a handful of Matt’s shirt between his fingers and tugs him along toward the other end of the aisle wordlessly. Matt can definitively say that he doesn’t appreciate being manhandled, but finds that right now, he doesn’t really feel himself caring. They loop around the shelves to find their way back to the register, where the cashier asks to see Ryan’s I.D. Stalling them just that little bit more.

“You fuck him ‘cause he looks like a girl, is that it? Got the right figure for it,”

Matt tenses up, refusing to turn around this time, though he knows he’s being targeted in this otherwise empty store.

“I think I get it, then. Fuckin’ fags can’t find any women so they go for the next best thing.”

Matt hears the printing of the receipt too loud in his ears, the rustle of the plastic bag, and then they’re leaving. Ryan grabs Matt’s wrist this time to pull him toward to door, the building’s parking lot feeling overtly empty in the light of the setting sun. His stomach is still so tight with worry, aware that they’re being followed.

“Well don’t hog him all to yourself, don’t I… Don’t I get a try, too?”

Ryan is still silent. Matt thinks they could be walking faster.

“Come on, pretty boy, be a good fag and let me-,”

And Matt yelps a little, helpless and distraught, when he suddenly feels a hand clap down on his shoulder. He swings around to shrug away from the touch, taking cautious and quick steps backwards towards the familiarity of Ryan that brings him an immediate sense comfort in that moment, however small. Ryan quickly takes the initiative that Matt is far too uncomfortable to do, though, stepping in front of him as a barrier between him and the senseless drunk.

“Don’t touch him.”

“Oh, y’don’t want me touching your boyfriend?”

Ryan steps closer, just about level height with the stranger but seeming so much bigger in Matt’s eyes. He’s in the man’s personal space, and when Matt takes in his figure, he notices that the hand free of a plastic bag is in a clenched fist held down by his side.

“I’m giving you five seconds to get out of here.”

“Or what? You think I’m jus’ gonna let a couple of homos like you run off?”

Five seconds has never felt so long to Matt, as he stands there in frozen fear, watching Ryan seethe and the drunk wobble, tied up in a standoff that Matt really wishes he could just run from. He gets his wish soon enough.

As the man opens his mouth to say something more, Ryan doesn’t waste any time in demonstrating his anger. He lifts a tight fist, and in a single blurred blink of a swing, the stranger is stumbling backwards, and Matt sees red blooming from his lip and onto his frail fingers. Matt takes an involuntary step back as well, terrified by the bout of violence, something he’s never outrightly witnessed before. It makes it a little worse that it’s Ryan, too, because he knows of Ryan’s temper, but he’s never seen it manifest itself into hurting another person. It’s off-putting, and he’s scared.

“Fuck off,” Ryan demands coldly, and this time, there’s no hesitation from the unpleasant stranger. The old man turns to make off in the other direction with unsure steps, muttering something to himself and holding a hand to his mouth. Ryan then turns to Matt, with an expression that matches how Matt is feeling- like he can’t choose between being concerned or just generally upset by what’s happened.

“Are you good?” Ryan asks, brushing some of his long hair away from his face before shoving his free hand in the pocket of his usual black shorts. His eyebrows are set heavily, giving him a gloomy, frustrated look. And sure, he looks like that most of the time, but now, Matt considers that it’s justified.

With a nod, no useful words immediately springing to mind, Matt confirms that he’s just shaken up at best.

“Sorry, I guess.”

“It’s fine, I just… I-I didn’t expect it.” Matt assures him, and he bets that Ryan isn’t really buying it. He still feels unsettled by watching Ryan so forcefully lash out at someone, and figures that he’s not hiding it very well. Ryan’s eyes keep darting over his face like they’re searching for something, and Matt can’t decide if the brown of his eyes appears to be more warm or dark in this moment.

“I’m kind of used to people being assholes when I would go out places with Chris. That’s why I didn’t say anything at first. Starting a fight with them usually only makes it worse.”

He starts walking again, heading down the road towards his house. Without being asked, Matt makes the move to follow him, and begins walking, too.

“Well I just… Thanks for sticking up for me.” Matt says sincerely, albeit sheepishly. He debates inwardly for a second if he should mention something about how afraid he was, but ultimately decides that if Ryan didn’t already know, then dropping the information wouldn’t add much to the conversation. Maybe he feels as though he should tell him just so that Ryan knows how helpless he would have been on his own in that situation, and how dependent he is on people to shield the coward in him that shies away from trouble. Ultimately, he doesn’t bother saying anything more, figuring that Ryan must know most of that, anyway.

“Yeah, no problem.” Ryan says, facing away from Matt with his hand still in his pocket and the other gripping the bag of alcohol. Matt accepts it as one of the most sincere things Ryan has ever said to him.

\--

“ _Fuck_ ,” Ryan says, leaned back into the slight discomfort of his living room couch, fingers rubbing at the bridge of his nose with his eyes screwed shut. It’s later on- they’re nearly finished with _The Sandlot_ now, but Matt ends up pausing the movie in favor of seeing what suddenly has Ryan so stressed out.

Only the kitchen light is on in the house, and the late hour leaves the rest of the room mostly dark, save the for the dim lighting that douses he and Ryan in dull technicolor.

“What?” Matt asks, his voice sounding too loud in the now silenced room as he looks over at Ryan on the other end of the couch.

Ryan leans forward so that his elbows rest on his knees, and be covers his face with his hands, sighing quietly. He’s had more than a few of the lemonades they managed to escape with from the liquor store, so Matt’s best guess is that Ryan is just starting to feel them. He knows now how unnerving it is to suddenly realize you’re intoxicated. Though, Matt figures that Ryan of all people would be used to that feeling by now.

“I forgot to buy more painkillers.” He says, looking so completely defeated over something that seems relatively trivial to Matt. One of his first thoughts is that Ryan might want them for some stupid high, or _something_ along those lines. But he doesn’t want to jump to conclusions, doesn’t want to assume anything and make Ryan upset with him.

“What do you need them for?” He asks, tone a little more lax and whispered. He hears the beginnings of rainfall against the living room window, but the room is still mostly quiet.

Ryan doesn’t answer right away, just keeps his head in his hands, and Matt starts to feel like maybe something is actually wrong. Something that a couple of ibuprofen wouldn’t really be able to help.

“Ryan?” He asks, and shuffles along the short length of the couch, closer to Ryan. He’s hyper-aware of Ryan’s even breathing, too focused on the fact that he’s just sitting there quietly, not saying a thing. Just _breathing_. Maybe Matt’s reading into it too much, but it’s unlike Ryan to not always have some immediate sharp or insulting remark to respond with. He’d like to think he spends enough time around Ryan these days to have known earlier that something was bothering him, but maybe he’s not as perceptive as he’d like to be. Or maybe this is about things that Ryan doesn’t want him knowing about.

After a few more beats of stillness, with Matt practically holding his breath, beginning to wonder if somehow any of this is his fault, if Ryan’s mad after what happened at the liquor store, if he should just leave- Ryan sits back upright.

“Sorry, I’m just- I get a lot of headaches. I go through a lot of painkillers.”

Matt feels his eyebrows draw together with sympathy, and he looks at Ryan in a way that he hopes looks less pitying than it looks genuinely concerned.

“You know, that’s probably because you drink too much.”

Ryan looks over at Matt with a raised eyebrow, questioning, challenging. He looks as though he wonders if Matt actually knows what he’s talking about, but he doesn’t want to actually say it out loud.

“You don’t drink enough water. That can give you headaches,” Matt clarifies with a nod at his own words, as if that’ll further verify them as true.

“I guess, yeah.” Ryan agrees. But Matt isn’t finished there.

“And you forget to eat half the time.” Matt inches even closer on the couch, so that their legs are just about touching. Ryan doesn’t make a move to back away, doesn’t sink further into the arm he’s leaning against in an attempt to gain back the empty space. Matt takes that as a good sign at least. His heart is beating a little quicker than normal, and he doesn’t know why he suddenly feels like pestering Ryan about taking better care of himself. Instead of dropping the urge to continue, though, he follows it. He doesn’t know what’s coming over him.

With a hand that Matt tries to ignore the tremble of, he reaches up towards Ryan’s mostly unreadable face, his expression too bland for Matt to make anything out of it. If Ryan were to ask him what’s he’s doing, or why, Matt doesn’t know that he’d have a good answer. Fortunately, though, Ryan doesn’t question it.

“You also don’t get enough sleep,” He says, his index finger tracing the dark circles under one of Ryan’s eyes as if to prove his point. Matt’s voice comes out even quieter than he meant for it to, so hushed and delicate, because he almost feels afraid of disrupting the calm state they’re in. The last time he saw Ryan appear to be this vulnerable was nearly two months ago during Chris’s initial intrusion, and Matt doesn’t know when he’ll get the chance to level with him like this again.

Ryan looks up to meet Matt’s eyes while Matt’s fingertips rest so lightly on his face, and time really feels so slow, Matt realizes, each time he ends up this close to Ryan. Whether it’s a staredown or a silent conversation, Matt can’t really tell- but it’s over soon enough anyway. Ryan turns his head, and Matt drops his hand as he lets out an uneven breath he hadn’t realized he was holding. He tunes into the fact that the rain has picked up now, tapping even louder against the window. It all sounds like a calculated rush of a watery symphony outside, rather than like so many fleeting raindrops that fall accidentally into place.

“Yeah, well that stuff can’t really be helped.” Ryan says. Instead of sounding gruff and dismissive like Matt bets is what he wishes to sound like, his voice is just a little croaky and resigned. He seems as though he’s not up for an argument about it, so Matt doesn’t bother trying to coax him into better self-care, figuring it a lost cause. He’s not sure why he cares so much what Ryan does with himself, anyway. Ryan’s headaches shouldn’t really be his problem.

“I’m gonna make you some tea to help you go to sleep, because I think that’s probably what you need most.” Matt announces definitively, because he doesn’t think it deserves to be up for discussion, and rises from the sofa. Fortunately, Ryan seems too worn out to disagree, and just shrugs, a barely-there movement of his shoulders. Matt takes it as a small sign of defeat that he won’t admit to.

After managing to miraculously find a nearly empty box of teabags and a small saucepan amidst Ryan’s mostly bare cupboards, Matt brews the tea whether Ryan wants it or not. He’s determined to do something to help Ryan feel better, even if he feels like he’s playing house. Even if this feels like too much more than just making Ryan a drink, for some reason that he can’t and doesn’t want to place. It’s quiet for the most part, until Matt’s halfway done boiling the water and Ryan has pressed play on the movie again. Matt figures he’s just impatient.

“Here,” Matt says once he’s back in the living room, now holding a warm mug of tea by the handle and offering it over to Ryan. There’s steam rising out of the cup, a sort of fog between them, and Matt notices that he’s focusing more on that than on Ryan as he hands over the drink. Suddenly, though, he’s much more attuned to Ryan when their fingers brush on the mug.

“Oh my gosh, how are your hands so cold?” He asks, incredulous as to why, in the middle of one of the hottest summers in years, in a house with awful AC, Ryan’s fingers feel so frozen.

In a typical fashion that Matt should have expected, Ryan only shrugs in response. He has the mug in one hand, and seems to have the sense to at least wait to take a burning sip, which Matt is thankful he didn’t have to remind him to do. Tonight, though, Matt doesn’t want to accept that as an answer, and he takes his seat back next to Ryan on the sunken-in couch. They’re close, still, but Matt’s brain is telling him that they could be closer.

What runs through his mind on loop as he takes Ryan’s frigid free hand between his own two warm ones is that this must just be an instinct, something his mother taught him. She, and God, of course, would always tell him to take care of others, to love his neighbors, right? It shouldn’t be weird to him, and… it’s not. He can’t judge Ryan’s blank stare, unsure of if he’s absolutely hating this crossing of boundaries, but Matt thinks that holding Ryan’s hand without any second thoughts shouldn’t bother either of them. It’s just to show Ryan that he cares, instead of scaring him away by outrightly saying so.

There are a few seconds of silence between them that instill more and more of a creeping fear in Matt the longer that they both sit there. The movie is in its last few scenes, now, but Matt is just judging Ryan for a reaction, not even pretending to be interested in the TV screen. He feels still and a little frozen, a bit like Ryan’s fingers between his own. Thankfully, Ryan ends up saying a few words that seem to unpause everything, just like unpausing the DVD that skips on the screen Matt isn’t looking at.

“They’re always cold,” He says simply, and then takes a sip of his drink that Matt cringes at, knowing how hot it still must be. Ryan does make a face at it, but the comment he makes isn’t about the temperature.

“What, no sugar? I’m just supposed to drink bland-ass tea?”

Matt blinks a few times, and his shoulders start to untense, his heart unfurling from the tiny, anxious knot it had shrank into without his knowing. His fingers wrap tenderly around Ryan’s own, and he tries to keep the movement more autonomous than focusing so heavily on it as he carries on the conversation. Ryan isn’t bothered, which is a relief, yet he bets it’s mostly because he seems to be decently drunk from the lemonade, at least halfway to hammered. Matt can’t think of any excuses for himself.

“Well yeah, it’s supposed to help you sleep. Sugar would do the opposite of that.” He informs Ryan, like it should be obvious.

“ _Fine_ ,” Ryan huffs, and takes another sip that must be mostly steam, making another face only after he swallows, presumably at its dull taste.

They sit there and watch the remaining parts of the movie, narrator Smalls now letting everyone know where all of the sandlot players headed off to in their later years. Matt thinks he missed some key parts in the middle of the movie somewhere, so he isn’t entirely sure what’s happening, but he watches on as if he does.

A little distractedly, his eyes flit down to Ryan’s hand between his own, and his palms open up to reveal Ryan’s fingers that are now warm enough for him to let go. He doesn’t though, not yet. Just stares at the bitten-down nails and the slightly calloused fingertips- and all the white marks across his knuckles.

“You’ve got a lot of scars on your fingers.” Matt notes absently, but quickly looks up as soon as he’s realized the nature of his comment. He can never be too sure of what kind of mood Ryan’s in, or how Ryan will take things. His eyes are nervous and he doesn’t look up all the way, more gazing through his eyelashes, peeking with his head bowed towards their hands. Fortunately, this time around, Ryan doesn’t seem all that bothered by the comment.

“Yeah,” He sighs, taking another sip and pulling the same expression again, scrunching his nose up in distaste as if he expected the tea to suddenly taste different. Seeming a little defeated, he leans forward a bit to place the mug on the messy coffee table in front of him, moving only enough to place it, but not enough to free his hand from Matt’s.

“They’re from getting into fights.”

“Fights?” Matt repeats, voice sounding distant and slightly scared, though he doesn’t know why the fact should shock him as much as it seems to.

“I fought with a lot of people in high school for stupid reasons. It fucks up your hands, especially the ones that last for a while.”

“Why would you feel like you had to punch them?”  Matt wonders, because he saw Ryan do it today, and didn’t like the guy that was following them around, sure, but he doesn’t know if hurting anyone who troubles them is really the best course of action.

“Like I said, it was usually for stupid reasons. I was really angry as a teenager and hung around the wrong people. I usually regretted it, unless it was to protect Chris. Not that I would have ever told anyone that.”

Matt sighs, and figures it’s time that he let Ryan have his hand back. He lets go, and then places his own hands in his lap purposefully, as if to make sure he doesn’t reach for Ryan’s other hand next.

“I really wish you wouldn’t tell me things like that,” He finds himself saying, and focuses on watching the end credits scroll across the CRT in front of him. His eyes burn as he stares unblinkingly for a little while, yet feels like he can’t look away, his mind somewhere else.

“Aw, is little Matt getting worried about me?” Ryan asks mockingly, his tone grossly sweet. The banter doesn’t last for very long, though, as he says next, more seriously, “I’m really not like that anymore. I know today is probably the worst day to try and convince you, but it’s true. I’m still an asshole, but I at least punch people a whole lot less.”

Matt appreciates the reassuring words, but he feels as though he doesn’t want to give in to Ryan’s assumptions. Of _course_ that makes Matt worried, makes Matt wonder of all the enemies Ryan might have made in the past, of all the times he made bad decisions that he must think don’t matter anymore. How many times has he put himself in danger just because he wanted to act tough for somebody else, or even for his own stupidly selfish reasons? It’s hard for Matt to decide if it’s strangely endearing or off-putting, but either way, he doesn’t think he wants Ryan to know that he’s thinking that hard about it.

“No, I’m not worried,” Matt says with a scoff that he hopes Ryan can’t see past, “It’s just confirming for me how stupid you really are. Only jerks punch people.”

Ryan turns to give Matt this look that seems as though he’s surprised, and maybe even a little impressed by his words. The small smirk lets Matt know that he didn’t say the wrong thing for once, so he doesn’t bother letting Ryan know that he doesn’t actually think he’s stupid at all, that he just wants him to be safe and less rash in his decisions to pick fights.

Because that would make him seem a little too worried about him. For now, Matt just sits there on the sofa quietly as Ryan shuffles through a stack of DVDs to find something else to watch. He tries to keep a mental note to pick up painkillers at the drugstore before heading home.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> if you, for any reason, would wanna talk about the fic (because i love it or you love it or both) feel free to hmu on my tumblr russianhousedj! or if you just wanna chat in general. i welcome inbox and messenger spam, just don't be a porn bot. thx.
> 
> ps comments are appreciated, but maybe you already know that by now :-)


	7. A Mausoleum's Ravine

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sry for the late update. sry for this chapter.
> 
> the awful ms paint gallery  
> [ryan's house](https://ibb.co/fWqXsp)  
> [the church](https://ibb.co/i7AAdU)  
> [entire town map](https://ibb.co/hNirk9)

Where before Matt just wanted to do what he was told, and settled for Ryan as just someone that would suffice for the summer, everything feels like it’s changed now. He’s not a useless job Matt didn’t sign up for; Ryan has a pretty solid place in his life for the time being, and Matt likes it that way. Of course, he still wants to do right by everyone, and have his father’s approval, and be seen as at least _somewhat_ worthy in the eyes of God. It’s all less of a pressing _need_ now though, replaced with the fresh and invigorating feelings of a friendship that Matt never thought he’d have.

It’s something of a secret, though, which Matt is regretful about. His dad is someone he thinks he’d rather not know about who exactly he’s been spending all his time around, because he sometimes can barely stand to stop nitpicking Matt. If he knew that Matt was willing spending so much time around someone so rude and vile, someone named a “delinquent,” Matt would never hear the end of it- and more importantly, might never even be permitted to talk to Ryan anymore. And be has to do what his dad tells him to, right?

He’s done a decent job of keeping it under wraps if he says so himself, excusing himself to partake in overseeing the “service hours” on Wednesday and Saturday. Most other days he’ll just tell his father he’s spending time with Chris, or helping Martha Sinclair in her garden, or _something_. It’s not lying if it’s not really hurting anyone, right? And it doesn’t hurt anybody as long as his dad doesn’t find out.

The church’s youth group has meetings every Tuesday night, and Matt is one person in particular that really shouldn’t be asked to help out. At least, that’s what _he_ thinks, considering high school was barely a breeze when _he_ was in it- how is supposed to get along with a bunch of high schoolers as a loser 21 year old with only one friend and no fashion sense? It doesn’t often matter what he wants, though, when it comes to the pastor, because Matt was practically ordered to stick around for the weekly meeting at dinner the night before. And if he can’t listen to what his father tells him, what _really_ is he good for?

Matt’s alone in the sanctuary, cleaning up before all the kids arrive. Or, more rather, trying to make himself look busy. His dad isn’t breathing down his neck for once, but he doesn’t want to take the chance of looking lazy if the pastor did decide to suddenly stop by. Hopefully, the leader of the youth group won’t ask or need much from Matt, and he’ll be able to let the evening pass by as he waits patiently in one of the back pews for the meeting to be over with.

The church doors open behind Matt, and he doesn’t turn around right away, afraid of looking too suspicious to his dad or to some of the highschool kids, or whoever it is that’s walking in. He just stays trained on the ground, sweeping the same spot on the floor that hasn’t been dirty for the the last fifteen minutes. He can’t just disregard whoever it is, though, because they speak next, and Matt jumps at the words that he couldn’t ignore even if he wanted to.

“I thought I told you to stay away from him.”

There’s a bit of an echo in the empty building, making the stern voice all the more booming and scary. Or maybe it’s not quite as loud as Matt thinks. Maybe he’s just afraid that someone will hear.

He turns around, still holding the broom in his hand pathetically, and looks to see Chris pacing towards him with a scowl on his face. Matt had a strong guess as to who the voice belonged to, of course, but it was so unlike Chris to speak so angrily with such a sharpness to his voice that Matt really couldn’t be sure. Or rather, just didn’t really want to believe it.

“I-I don’t get what-,” Matt starts to say, broom in hand and still standing between a couple pews as if they’re somehow supposed to give him safety.

“You know exactly what I’m talking about,” Chris interrupts, now just feet away from Matt. He feels like a child being reprimanded, and he draws his shoulder together subconsciously. Chris has this angry look in his eyes that makes Matt want to shrink in on himself and disappear.

The majority of Matt’s thoughts are to apologize, or to tell Chris that he was right about Ryan all along- _something_ to get him off of his back. But Matt has always been so passive, always letting his parents rule most of his life and living by God’s rules rather than having his own. If spending so much time around Ryan has helped him realize anything, it’s that he should stand up for himself for once and not take this lying down.

“He’s my friend, Chris.” Matt says definitively, warranting all the days he’s spent with Ryan. Maybe he should have said something more along the lines of protest, something to let Chris know that who he’s spending time with isn’t his business. But retaliating at all is a victory enough for now, however small. Matt can’t say that it doesn’t feel good to make some effort to fight back.

“Yeah, I spoke with him today and that’s what he told me, too.” Chris says with a roll of his eyes. He advances, moving in a little further until the back of Matt’s knees his the pew startles him. Then broom falls from his hands to clatter to the ground loudly, and Matt doesn’t know the last time he’s felt so trapped. He finds that he has fleeting thoughts of wishing Ryan was here to protect him.

“Someone like him isn’t capable of having friends, you know that, right? He’s not worth anyone’s time. He knows that, and he knows that as soon as you realize that, you won’t want to spend another second with him. When are you going to back off and leave him behind? It’s what he deserves.”

Matt’s mouth is hanging open stupidly, as though he can’t think of anything smart to say in return. And for a few seconds, he really can’t. He knows that Ryan isn’t always the kindest to himself, but does he really have so little faith in their friendship? Matt figured that Ryan would trust him at this point, at least a little. He has these questions and uncertainties and fears, but above all else, Matt really just wonders why Chris even cares so much in the first place.

“Okay, I know you two had a… history, or whatever, but that doesn’t give you the right to be so mean to him.” Matt says, wondering if Ryan would also jump at the chance to defend him like this if the roles were reversed. It doesn’t matter, either way, really. Even if Ryan doesn’t value their time together as Matt does, he knows that sticking up for him is the right thing to do. Still, speaking to Chris so seriously like this is scary. Chris’s eyebrows are set heavily above his eyes that have never looked so uninviting and cold. It’s off-putting to someone like Matt, who can sometimes barely pay a cashier without feeling a little nervous.

“You don’t know him like you think you do, Matt. He’s fucked up.”

_Maybe not, but I care about him_ \- is what Matt wants to say. He finds himself swallowing the words back instead.

“I know that who I’m friends with shouldn’t matter to you, whether you like them or not.”

“I know what’s best for you. So I’m telling you, stop wasting your time with him.”

“I-I don’t have to listen to you.”

Chris’s face twists up into a laugh at that. His eyebrows are raised, and a smile that looks close to a sneer is forming an expression that Matt has decided he doesn’t like.

“Oh, you don’t?” He asks, and despite knowing that it must be rhetorical, Matt still shakes his head anyway with defiance. His words seem to be failing him, but he thinks that, since he’s in this far, there’s no going back now.

“Would your father be happy to know who you’ve been spending all this time with?”

And there it is. Matt honestly never that that someone like himself would ever be in a position to be actually _blackmailed_. Especially not by a Sunday school teacher

Although it’s hard for Matt to keep his brain locked on a single thought for very long anyway, he finds that he can’t seem to figure out Chris’s motive for this, anyway. The only thing he’s sure of in all of this is that he’s absolutely sick of being afraid of other people all the time. Matt knows that he’ll probably always be a coward, but he’s not going to let it hold him back this time, or anymore. The fear of upsetting the wrong people or saying the wrong thing is there, but Matt’s acknowledging it and leaving it behind.

“Like I said, I don’t have to listen to you. So leave Ryan and I alone, you don’t have any place messing with us.”

It’s about as stern as he can put it- Matt admittedly doesn’t feel very intimidating, but by the look on Chris’s face, it doesn’t seem like he was expecting any resistance at all. There’s these few seconds of silence that follow where Chris just stares Matt down, as if expecting him to crack. Truth be told, if Chris had stuck it out just a little bit longer, or threatened him some more, he probably would have. But as luck would have it, Chris didn’t have the patience to stare into Matt’s unwavering blue eyes for very long, and he eventually looks away.

With an annoyed huff and the angry look still stagnant on his face, Chris turns back towards the church’s entrance wordlessly. Matt waits until he’s completely out the doors before letting go of a shaky breath he’d been holding in. He knows that for most other people, something like this shouldn’t really be considered a feat, or even very much of a victory. For Matt, though, it’s something close to a miracle.

Strangely enough, though, his first thoughts aren’t of God and of saying a prayer to thank him for giving him the strength he needed in that situation. As Matt sits down in the pew with his hands only slightly clammy and his heartbeat just a little bit erratic, he can’t help but think of Ryan. He thinks of how Ryan is so unapologetic for the way he is and the way he behaves, not thinking twice about sneering at a police officer or punching some random drunk guy. For the most part, Matt doesn’t always love that side of Ryan. Being so brash and impulsive really gets him into trouble sometimes, and Matt often wants to tell him to just take a breather and stop being so upset with the world for a little while. Now, though, Matt thinks that he may even owe Ryan a thank-you for giving him faith for once. And not just in God, but faith in himself.

Not too long after Chris has left and Matt has had some time to just sit and collect himself, the doors open again. This time, however, the sound of them opening is accompanied by teenage voices- Matt never thought he’d be so relieved for the start of the youth group meeting. He allows the welcome distraction, and uses the opportunity to strictly _not_ think about Chris. More specifically, he chooses to not think about what would happen if Chris _did_ end up telling his father. For now, he’s just getting through one thing at a time, but plans on heading to see Ryan as soon as he’s free of his obligations

\--

Matt didn’t get a chance to go talk with Ryan about his little encounter after the meeting had ended. He was asked to mow the lawn before the sun went down, and then couldn’t find a good excuse to get away from his parents. The thing is though, that under normal circumstances, Matt would still see Ryan within the following days. But those days go by, and suddenly it’s Friday, making for three days without spending any time together.

It’s not that Matt is _clingy_ \- he at least _tries_ not to be - but he’s admittedly pretty used to their routine hangouts. Maybe it wouldn’t be that bad if Matt wasn’t sticking around the church, waiting for Ryan to come bursting in through the church doors unannounced like he sometimes does. Maybe it’d weigh less on his mind if Matt weren’t hoping to spot Ryan downtown to catch him and ask to go do something together. Maybe for Matt, he’d feel less clingy if he hadn’t walked all the way to Ryan’s house on Thursday to try and find him there, only for there to be no answer when he knocked on the door.

It shouldn’t feel off, as any pair of people spend time apart, but to Matt, something seems wrong. On Friday, he figures he should try and figure out what’s up. When he ponders it, he can’t possibly fathom what Ryan could be busy with, if anything. Calling up the shitty landline Ryan’s got and asking just seems like overstepping their boundaries, though, and if Ryan is already growing distant then Matt doesn’t want to push him away any further.

The person Matt has grown to be so comfortable around now makes him feel awkward to think about, makes him think he’s said or did something wrong and Ryan is just trying to get rid of him. One of Matt’s last efforts is to try the house again. He bets this is all just a misunderstanding. He _knows_ Ryan by now, knows that he often _does_ without thinking. And if knocking on his door day after day is annoying, then so be it. At this point, if Ryan doesn’t already consider him a clingy mess of a friend, then he might never. So what’s the harm, really?

Now overly aware of the fact that his dad might be wondering where he heads off to all the time, he waits until it’s later in the night to sneak off to see Ryan. There’s a prominent thought that springs up as he’s shutting his front door quietly behind him, leaving the quiet house to walk on to another one, and it’s embarrassing; he feels like a teenager sneaking out to their crush in one of those horrible teen romance movies. Matt hastily disregards the realization that, the only thing different here is that he’s technically an adult. And, that he’s not off to see his crush, but the only person he really even talks to.

On the walk over to Ryan’s place, Matt is distracted by a sensory overload. It’s as if his brain is latching onto everything around him so as to avoid being anxious over Ryan. It’s just stopped raining a little over an hour ago, and the late hour’s moon glistens over the still-wet asphalt. The grass is wet too, where the frogs chirping from their hiding places seem louder than ever. The flowers smell strangely sweeter too, and a light humid fog rests gently above the pavement as Matt walks on. The night’s small wonders serve as decent distractions to avoid thinking about what Ryan might say to him once he gets there.

When Matt first knocks on the door, there’s no answer. Matt’s tempted to look in the window, but he refrains, knowing that if he’s here to potentially get back on Ryan’s good side, being creepy won’t help his case. Ryan must be home, right? If he’s not buying alcohol or off wandering somewhere by himself, there’s likely no other place he’d be. Matt feels stupid for feeling so determined, but he knocks again anyway. And then he waits, and waits, and wonders if this really _was_ a bad idea, if this is going to make Ryan even more upset with him, if-

But the door finally opens.

Ryan doesn’t looks happy to see him, but he doesn’t look upset either. To Matt, it looks as though he’s just stressed out, but with their lack of contact recently he couldn’t really begin to wonder why.

“Are you doing okay?” Matt asks, feeling only a little embarrassed that his voice sounds a little breathy and high pitched with worry. The worry that Ryan might be angry with him, of course, but also the concern of seeing Ryan looking strung-out like this.

During the walk from his own house to here, Matt was too wrapped up on the world around him, on the night’s sounds and smells and sights. Now, though, he couldn’t be more focused on anything other than Ryan. He’s tuned into the way his facial hair seems a little overgrown, and how his hair is messier than usual, not tied back at all but just falling in his face. Ryan won’t meet Matt’s eyes, but there’s something different about them. They’re still dark and hard to read like always, but something to Matt tells him that Ryan is distant, that his mind is clouded like the rain’s fog that’s leftover lingering on the streets.

“Yeah, why do you ask?” Ryan says, and he narrows his eyes a little as if he’s that confused, as though he doesn’t know why Matt trekked to his house alone at nearly midnight.

“Oh, I don’t know, maybe because I haven’t seen you since Monday. Where have you been?”

“I don’t know why you think that’s your business.”

The response is quick and cold, and Matt’s heart hurts a little at that, his chest feeling slightly caved-in with the impact. It’s not as though he hasn’t seen Ryan in a bad mood before, and he knows that he can get a little worked up if he’s drunk, too. This seems different than that, though. Ryan is speaking to Matt the same way he did when they first met, when they were under the obligations of two other people trying to direct their lives. It messes with Matt’s head and it’s hard to really sort out his thoughts. Matt feels like, after almost an entire two months spent with Ryan, trying to figure him out, being there for him, seeing his worst parts but sticking around anyway- he’s just back at square one.

Most of all, Matt just wonders why, and if  Ryan is doing this to hurt him on purpose.

“I-I don’t think it’s my business,” Matt says, and he swallows between his words because his throat suddenly seems a little dry. “I just want to make sure you’re okay, is all.”

He just looks at Ryan almost pleadingly, then, and Ryan stares back at him with this unnerving and solid gaze that Matt thinks might just break his spirit. He’s really ready to give up, to admit to himself that being friends with Ryan was a bad idea because he can never quite understand him, when Ryan’s features fall a little. He looks as though he’s not inwardly fighting with himself anymore as he sighs and opens the door wider so that Matt can come in.

Most days, _comfortable_ isn’t a word that Matt would use when he’s in Ryan’s house. The living room always smells faintly of mold, most of the furniture is breaking and uncomfortable, and the lights are too dim to ever call the place “lively.” Tonight, though, Matt can’t think of any other place he’d rather be. The lumps in the couch as he sits down on it don’t bother him, not when he’s just happy that Ryan is even speaking to him.

“I’m sorry, I’m not trying to be an asshole, I swear.” Ryan says after he shuts the front door, scrubbing a hand over his face tiredly. Matt isn’t really listening to whatever apology Ryan is offering that he may or may not really mean, though. Matt is too focused on something else, instead.

“What is that?” He asks, surprised and a little scared, but mainly concerned. Among all the scuffs and nail marks on the wall by the lonesome dining room table, there’s a hole in the drywall. It’s imperfect and cracked and crumbling, and Matt doesn’t know he’s sure how to process it. He thought he remembered Ryan telling him that he doesn’t have anger issues anymore.

Ryan sighs, as though he’s about to launch into a whole spiel, explain himself and his behavior, give Matt some answers. But he just looks at Matt with eyes that are a little bit worried, and simply says, “It’s Chris.”

“ _What?_ ” Matt asks, suddenly sitting up a little straighter, feeling a little less groggy despite the late hour.

“ _Chris_ punched a hole in your wall?”

“No, no,” Ryan shakes his head, and sighs as though he’s frustrated, as though he can’t quite piece things together or find the right words.

“I mean that I haven’t been avoiding you, it’s just-,”

He pauses, starts pacing, and that’s how Matt knows that something really must be bothering him. He can’t really think of a time he’s seen Ryan looking this worn-thin. Matt feels a little guilty for questioning and pestering when Ryan is clearly going through more than he’s letting on. He didn’t want to stress Ryan out further, only let him know that he’s on his side.

“Chris came here the other day.” Ryan explains, and much to Matt’s relief, stops pacing in favor of heading closer to the dining table and leaning against the wall there. Matt guesses he might be too fidgety to completely sit for now.

“You know, at first I didn’t even want to let him in. I wanted to be able to say no to him for once. But he mentioned you, and then I got worried that something was wrong, or that he was going to try doing something to you. I don’t know if it’s obvious, but he’s always been the jealous type.”

Matt nods, because maybe in the past it wasn’t very clear, but from Chris’s recent actions, it’s plain to see that he’s being spurred on by jealousy.

“He was actually sort of calm about it at first, which was surprising- he started telling me that I shouldn’t spend time with you, that it’s just making trouble for both of us. But, of course, I told him he was crazy, because he doesn’t really _know_ …” Ryan trails off, and Matt perks up a bit, waiting for the end of the sentence. He can’t be sure what Ryan was planning on saying, though, because he doesn’t end up finishing the thought.

“Anyway, that’s when he started getting angry like he usually does. He tried saying stuff to make me mad, saying that I’m horrible for you, that you don’t really like me anyway. And I got mad, sure, but it was different then whenever we’d fight when we were dating. Whether those things are true or not, I knew that he was just trying to manipulate me into staying away from you.”

“But it worked, didn’t it?” Matt finds himself blurting out, if only because he’s really afraid for the end of their friendship. “We didn’t hang out for what, almost four whole days? Whatever he said clearly got to you. Were you just going to never talk to me again because of someone like Chris?”

Despite the way Ryan’s eyebrows are drawn together, clearly guilty and upset, Matt still feels his cheeks beginning to heat up with slight anger. It feels completely irrational, and Matt’s not even sure what he’s really mad _at_. Is he mad at Chris, for trying to ruin one of the best things that’s come along in a while? Or is he mad at Ryan, for backing down without much of a fight, for being seemingly so willing to just drop Matt as a friend because one person told him to? He hates the feeling, but it swells. He clenches his jaw and feels stiff in his seat, but he lets Ryan fend for himself. Maybe he’ll make a good case

“ _No_ , of course not, I mean-,” Ryan pushes away from the wall again. He can’t seem to keep still.

“I know what it seemed like, okay? I don’t usually say stuff like this, but I… I really don’t want to lose you. As a friend.” He’s standing in front of the couch now, facing Matt and talking with his hands as if hoping that’ll sooner make Matt understand.

“If I wasn’t hanging out with you, I’d probably have crawled back to him by now, and I’d be miserable all the fucking time. I don’t want to just drop you, Matt. I just needed some time to think, I don’t know…”

“Time to think?” Matt asks, a little less frustrated when he hears Ryan’s words sounding so genuine and strained. If he’s honest, though, he still can’t fully understand where Ryan’s coming from. Time to think about what? To Matt, there are really only two ways to go about something like that- either tell Chris to mind his own business and not change a thing, or be scared into leaving Matt alone. It seems to be as black and white as it gets.

“Yeah,” Ryan says, and after all of the words he’s said that sound so free of resolve, his voice now sounds the weakest. “Chris knows a lot of things about me. I’m sure there’s some old dirt he has on me that he wouldn’t be afraid to bring up.”

And Matt’s stomach just absolutely sinks, this wave of disheartened chills coming over him in a rush. He hates that anything like this has to happen, that things are turning out this way. Threats and dramatics and mean Sunday school teachers- it all seems like things that should belong in someone else’s life, not _Matt’s_ life. He suddenly doesn’t feel so angry anymore.

Despite it feeling awful to have to deal with someone having it out for him, dealing with blackmail and someone so full of spite, that’s not even the worst of it. Chris is scary, sure, but Matt is upset most by how much this is clearly eating Ryan up, and how he’s been fretting about what to do. Does he really think he has to worry about things like this on his own?

“Well, I at least wish you would have just come talk to me about it instead of trying to decide what to do all by yourself. I get that you didn’t want to make Chris angrier or give him any reason to come after you, but we’re friends, right? I hate for you to think that you would rather avoid me instead of coming to me.”

Ryan looks at him so that their eyes meet, and Matt wishes he knew what Ryan is thinking of saying, what all is circling in his head.

“You’re simplifying it.” Ryan eventually responds, and he shakes his head at himself, or at _something._ He takes a couple steps so that he can sit, or more rather fall onto, the couch, looking exhausted as he leans his head back. His expression conveys to Matt that his mind is racing, but that he isn’t going to let any of his thoughts be heard.

Matt wants to know what Ryan _means,_ what more there could possibly be to the dilemma Ryan was faced with. How can Matt be simplifying a choice so blatant and stark- stay or go, talk or don’t? He wants to press to find out. He just wants Ryan to _talk_ with him, because even after walking all the way here on his own and getting Ryan to open up, Matt still has unanswered questions. But Matt has learned that with Ryan, there are limits, and even better, has learned when and when not to test them.

“So, was it Chris who punched the wall?”

“Uh, no,” Ryan admits, looking over at Matt a little sheepishly. Matt wonders why, after all that he’s seen from Ryan - from having drugs in his possession to outrightly hitting a guy - that Ryan chooses to be embarrassed now.

“Chris really made me mad and I was really stressed and frustrated after he left, and… now there’s a hole in the wall.”

Ryan seems more upset by the fact than he might normally be, and Matt doesn’t know if he’s equipped to properly diffuse him and make him feel any better. He figures, if he can’t say the right thing, having never been as good with words as he wishes he could be, he can at least distract Ryan for a little while. Getting Ryan’s mind off of it all seems like it would be the best option for him right now.

“Do you want to go to the old Winn Dixie to get your mind off of it?” Matt asks, thinking up the suggestion on a whim. Even after doing it once before, spray painting old buildings is still admittedly not one of Matt’s favorite things to do. He likes the idea, though, that even something he hates can end up being not so bad if he’s doing it with the right person. Especially if that someone is Ryan.

It seems to take a few moments for Ryan to react, or maybe even register that Matt has said something. He does eventually look as though he’s broken free from his thoughts, and points his gaze over at Matt with an expression that, miraculously, doesn’t look too worn-down.

“Fucking… Sure, I don’t see why not.” He responds, and he even starts to smile a little. Matt smiles back, hoping that it’s obvious that he mainly just doesn’t want or need Ryan to be moping around in his house, all lonely and tense.

He won’t say it, of course, but as they head out, Matt is still stuck on the idea of Chris, if only a little. He’s afraid that Chris and his jealousy will cause he and Ryan unnecessary problems. He’s afraid that Chris will tell the pastor about their friendship, or that Ryan will end up punching more walls if this all doesn’t reach a resolution soon. At the same time, though, Matt is fed up with worrying. He has this prominent thought of _who cares_ just swimming through him as he walks with Ryan down the road to abandoned supermarket, and he just doesn’t want to shake the feeling of being liberated.

\--

Liberation, as it seems, can really only last so long. Maybe it was all just a front to begin with, anyway.

Only a mere two days after leaving more awful works of art on an old building, Matt is on his own and heading home. He’s walking back from Ryan’s place mid-day, because Ryan was scheduled for a second shift at work for once, covering for someone else. Having the afternoon to himself is nice, Matt realizes, even in the blazing sun. He’s grown accustomed to always being around Ryan, but he knows that a break can be good for him.

Maybe, because he was feeling so carefree and airy, he should have realized something was up. Of course, though, it doesn’t register that much could shatter his good mood until he arrives back at home, and he feels his stomach drop with one look at the front porch. He wishes he could just turn back around, but his dad has already seen him. The pastor calls his name.

“Concerned” could be a word to describe the expression on the face of Matt’s father. To Matt, though, it really just looks more mad than anything. There’s no disappointment, or hint in his features that all of this could be anything but a time of punishment and accusation for Matt. The look on Chris’s face is what really bothers him the most, though, this innocence and sympathy that is so beyond feigned, Matt wonders how the pastor is even buying it. Chris, apparently, as Matt has come to learn, is very good at keeping up an act.

“How is the community service coming along?” Comes the dreaded question once Matt is up the front porch steps, the sun suddenly making his own skin feel so much tighter.

This should be easy, Matt begins to inwardly reason with himself. It should be a simple feat to keep his cool, to stick to the story he’s been telling for the past two months- or at least something close to it. All this time spent with someone else has really weakened Matt’s resolve, though, and if Matt thought he was sheepish and weak around his father before, a whole summer spent just out of his reach has really only made it worse. Matt’s stomach turns, and he knows that his lies are brittle and bound to come falling down in just mere minutes

“It’s going well,” Matt says blandly, swallowing, and for lack of anything better to say. It’s obvious where the conversation’s headed, and it’s obvious that there’s nothing he could say to help his case. But keeping up the act for just a little bit longer should be even a little bit less painful that immediately coming clean. Right?

“I don’t like it when you lie to me,” The pastor says next, so sternly, and _damn_ , Matt really hates that this all has to happen in front of Chris. Although it’s not prominently showing, Matt bets that he’s trying his hardest just to withhold an awful and stupidly smug smirk. Maybe he’ll let it show that he’s only in it for the vengeance, and then _his_ cover will be blown next. Matt can only hope.

Matt shifts his weight from foot to foot, and laughs a little, as if to try and convince himself and his father that this all really shouldn’t be this dire. No other laughs follow, and Matt decides that, if there were ever a time to, now is when he should absolutely give up.

“I’m sorry,” He says, and he shoves his hands in his back pockets to avoid wringing them together in front of himself like a reprimanded school kid. He’s already being chastised in front of an audience, being embarrassed like a child in front of his whole class. The last thing he wants is to play into the part.

“You know, I really wonder how any of this even came to be. This was supposed to just be for the good of the community, and now you’re off doing God knows what with some _punk_.”

If Matt’s honest, he almost completely forgot the whole reason he even started to spend time with Ryan in the first place. Friendship-wise, he’d consider that a good thing, as it shows just how much he’s actually grown to naturally rely on and like being around Ryan. In this case, though, with the pastor all but seething with wrinkles in his forehead and summer sweat on his temples, Matt wishes that he had remembered sooner. As if anything would have helped his case in the long run.

“I know,” Matt replies, still avoiding the gaze of his father.

“You _know?_ ” The pastor asks, condescendingly, mockingly. “Then tell me why you’ve been hanging around someone who’s had such a bad influence on you, if you knew you weren’t supposed to?”

Matt doesn’t answer, and he suspects that no one really expected him to.

“You know what Matthew, you’re lucky that God placed people like Chris in your life to watch out for you, or who knows what kind of crowd you’d have fallen into. People who are not committed to God are not meant to be in your life. Someone like Ryan is not part of the Lord’s plan for you.”

Any time in the past, all the way up to the start of the summer, Matt would have reacted differently than the way he is now. In other circumstances, had he been “uncorrupted,” Matt would usually feel like dropping to his knees in a prayer at this point in the conversation. He’d feel like asking God and his father for forgiveness, and like asking how to handle all the wrong that he’s done.

Right now, though, Matt can only direct this hardened stare - that he hopes isn’t too overtly cynical - directly at Chris. He resists the urge to roll his eyes at everything that his father is saying, because, and for not the first time, it all sounds like such complete _bullshit._ He doesn’t know if he’s ever had that exact thought before, but the guttural feeling of _knowing_ it has always been there.

In this moment, Matt doesn’t really want to think about God, or worry about if Chris thinks he’s a good Christian, or wonder if his dad thinks that he’s good enough. Right then, sweating and seething on his front porch before the two people he wishes he could run from most, Matt just wants to talk to Ryan. He of all people would definitely have some choice words to say about this whole ordeal.

The thought of that person now, the old Matt, makes Matt cringe at his own brainwashed ideals. He isn’t yet completely detached from the idea of God, but at this point, he couldn’t wish to be any further away from his dad and everything he teaches.

“So I take it you won’t be seeing him again, correct?”

As strong as he wishes he would feel, and as strong as he knows he _could_ feel if Ryan were by his side to support him, Matt knows that he just isn’t up for defending himself in this moment. Whether it be that he’s outnumbered, or because he might never be brave enough to just stand up on his own, he isn’t sure, and he doesn’t really want to think about it, either. Now, Matt just manages to quietly agree, and submit, because the last thing he wants is to create more trouble for himself, or especially for Ryan.

Matt nods to his dad, who seems to take the gesture as the compliance that he’s used to, and Matt’s mind is reeling. He’s thinking that he’ll always be this passive. He’ll always be a coward. He’ll always let things slip out from underneath him and react in foolish ways because that’s just who he is. Maybe Ryan hasn’t had an effect on him after all. Maybe he’ll always be the obedient church kid with no voice of his own at the end of the day.

From inside the house, Matt’s mother calls for his dad, and he realizes just a second too late what fate exactly that entails for him. Soon enough, the preacher retreats, and Matt’s left standing alone with Chris on his front porch. He feels like he can’t manage to look him in the face.

Looking off in the distance, Matt can see the faint grey of far away storm clouds beginning to make their way over. Matt stares off, looking over Chris’s shoulder, past the unmoving windchimes hanging from the porch. In their clouds he can make out the flashes of distant lightning, brightening the sky intermittently. He’s really trying to focus on anything other than Chris, in an attempt to keep this awful rage kept pressed down in his chest. Matt isn’t much one for anger- he doesn’t ever really feel like this, doesn’t ever feel it swarming in him like this. But he does now, because he feels like he can’t be sure who to trust anymore. He hates that the one person who he used to think could understand him is now taking away the one person that actually _does_. Matt decides that it’s, for lack of a better word, a very shitty feeling.

When he does dare a glance at Chris’s face, now feeling at least a little less likely to lash out at him, the expression he gets a look at is so _smug_. It doesn’t do anything to calm the writhing of his thoughts and his emotions in his head.

“Why are you doing this?” Matt asks coldly, moving his arms to cross over his chest. He knows that he must not look intimidating, especially not to someone with such cruel intentions as Chris- but he can at least _try_ looking a little less pathetic.

“Don’t act like I didn’t tell you this would happen. I _told_ you- you need to stay away from Ryan. Take it from someone who knows better.”

Matt scoffs, because at this point, he’s beyond sure that he himself can tell who he should and shouldn’t spend his time around. If Ryan were as horrible as Chris likes to make him out to be, Matt would know by now. And even if Ryan were so awful, Matt wouldn’t _care_. He finds himself realizing right then that, no matter what Chris says, or his father, or the Bible, or _anyone_ \- he doesn’t _care_. He knows that Ryan isn’t perfect; if he were, Matt might not have ever ventured to be friends with him in the first place.

Chris raises an eyebrow when Matt doesn’t respond, and Matt bets that he senses his lingering defiance. _Good_ , he thinks. _Know that you can’t win_.

“This was just a warning for not listening, you know that, right? If you go to see Ryan again, even after this, I’ll go to the police. I have years of dirt on him, I can let them know some things he won’t want them finding out about.

“You’re lying,” Matt snaps back instantly, though he doesn’t sound so sure of himself. He swallows thickly, as though trying to swallow back the doubt.

“Hit and runs? Drug charges? It’s worse than just spray painting a couple of old buildings, Matt. Do you really want Ryan going to jail just because you couldn’t leave him be?”

Matt has felt stuck for so long, always in between fearing God and questioning him. Between listening to his father and defying him. Matt is _used_ to feeling stuck, but this is the worst he thinks it’s ever been. Matt doesn’t know how he can possibly do what he wants, say what he needs to and tell Chris where to shove his threats, without also jeopardizing the one person he’s grown to care about most. Matt hasn’t ever been this stuck.

Chris still looks just as pleased with himself as he takes his leave in Matt’s silence, even going as far as to pat Matt on the shoulder before heading down the porch stairs. Matt can’t stand the fact that he can’t come up with a definitive answer to Chris’s question, or a solution that won’t hurt either himself or Ryan in the long run

He stands there idly, unmoving, and wonders how he ever ended up getting thrown into the middle of something like this in the first place.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 2 chapters left??? tell me how you're feeling :-)


	8. The Warmth of a Wasp Sting

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> wow hi it's been almost 2 weeks.... my b. almost done with the fic though! i'll try to be a little more on time with the last chapter :o)
> 
> the awful ms paint gallery  
> [ryan's house](https://ibb.co/fWqXsp)  
> [the church](https://ibb.co/i7AAdU)  
> [entire town map](https://ibb.co/hNirk9)

Matt wishes that he had more time to deliberate. Since his father banned him from spending time with Ryan, and Chris threatened to have Ryan arrested, Matt, unsurprisingly, hasn’t felt great. When a day or two would go by without any contact with Ryan before, Matt wouldn’t worry about it, because they always ended up together again, anyway. Now, though, stripped of the option to go visit him if wanted to, Matt’s realizing what a good thing that they had going for them. When he’s wishing most of all that he could just have someone to talk to, someone that he actually enjoys being around, that someone isn’t around.

It leaves him with this rigid and shaky feeling, something almost tangible that he can’t seem to shake. The next couple nights after being confronted and sentenced to being controlled, Matt’s on his own. The pastor specifically asks him to stay behind in the church while he works in his office, as if knowing that he’d otherwise be tempted to run off to see Ryan like some lovesick puppy. Now that he’s so confined, Matt realizes that he should have valued his freedom more. 

For two whole days, Matt thinks of almost nothing other than Ryan. He’s worried that this downward spiral of bad luck hasn’t stopped with the pastor knowing their “secret.” Mostly, Matt just hopes that Chris is leaving Ryan alone.

He feels selfish for wishing this didn’t happen to him, as though he himself is the only one being affected. Matt knows it’s really more than that, though. He wants a better outcome for himself, but he also wants what’s best for Ryan. Even after Chris’s multiple attempts to shed a bad light on him, Matt has this urge now more than ever to look out for him. Despite his father or anyone else most likely believing that he’ll sneak off to Ryan’s place, though, Matt doesn’t. He listens to what his dad tells him to do, because he’s a coward. He can’t let go of the thought, either, that if he’ll always remain a coward, then he’ll always remain selfish. Despite the desire to go find him and, what - warn him about Chris? Explain where he’s been? - Matt doesn’t go looking for Ryan.

Alone one of those lonely nights, wishing he were somewhere else, Matt becomes completely struck with fear. The church’s door opens a little slowly, and Matt can’t immediately make out who it is. He has guesses, and hopes, but regardless of who he  _ wants _ it to be, the prospect of a mysterious figure entering the church in the middle of the night is frightening on its own. It’s raining outside, dark and a little cold, and the body that slips in the building is completely soaked with rainwater. Matt is left to fend for himself amongst the collection of pews, with his dad shut away in his office. 

Matt can’t say he expected for Ryan to first come looking for _him_.

He stands from where he’d been bored in the pews, laying around while his eyes flitted around the familiar interior of the church. Thinking too much. Matt has a lot of questions, has so much that he’s been sitting on and wanting to say. Yet now, with Ryan feet from of him, he finds that all of his thoughts fly around too quickly for him to latch onto anything coherent. Most prominently, Matt wonders why Ryan bothered walking all the way here when it was raining. Didn’t he learn his lesson from getting sick the first time?

Like the weather outside, Ryan looks stormy, and way too solemn for Matt to be as elated as he thought he might be once they could meet up again. As Ryan paces closer, his steps are too calculated and slow for Matt to feel anything but uneasy. 

Once in front of him, Matt can make out bruising around the bridge of Ryan’s nose, a split in the middle of his bottom lip, and something of a shiner settled tenderly under his left eye. His chest has never felt so tight and filled with guilt. Before he can get a word out, ask Ryan what happened,  _ talk _ about what’s going on, Ryan speaks up first. His expression looks eerily similar to the way it did when he and Matt first officially met- Matt hates it. It’s a look that makes Matt think they might not be friends anymore. Everything feels so off as he starts talking.

“I don’t think we’re on the same page,” He says, voice all low and gravelly, as though he’s trying to keep it free of emotion.

“What? What do you mean?” Matt asks, and before he can even jump to any conclusions or gain an explanation from Ryan, his heart rate has already picked up. He’s thought and over-thought this predicament they’re in countless times over the past 48 hours, but this wasn’t ever in any of his imagined outcomes. Ryan looks too dark and somber. Matt feels like something is wrong.

“You know I never wanted this, right?”

“Wanted _what?”_ Matt questions, and he can’t help the way he takes on this desperate tone as he asks.

“To be friends? I needed some good merits on my record. You know, a better rep with Falcone to avoid trouble.”

Matt feels himself blinking excessively. A hand he has resting on the back end of a pew begins gripping onto the wood tighter. His fingers are sweaty. He wants to dig his nails into his palm.

Matt exhales something of a brittle laugh, disbelieving. “I thought that you ‘didn’t care’ about getting in trouble.” His fingers still clench and unclench on the pew, out of sync, without any rhythm.

“I care about it more than I care about you.”

The words fall like the heaviest of weights right into the pit of Matt’s stomach. His hand still moves anxiously and idly against the pew, as if searching for some solace to grip onto. He’s not going to find any, though. Not here, and not from Ryan.

“Do you think that I’ve  _ enjoyed _ your company? This was just something to keep the cops out of my hair.”

Matt’s cheeks are burning, the same burning as the hot tears he can feel welling in his eyes. He sputters and trips over his own words, his brain and tongue too tied to cooperate with him. 

“That’s not true. You  _ know _ it’s not true.”

Because it  _ can’t _ be, can it? Wasn’t it just the other day that Ryan was swearing he wanted Matt around, and that he didn't want to lose him? Matt’s not sure how he could misunderstand a sentiment like that, but maybe that’s just where he went wrong- actually believing Ryan’s words as true. Maybe it was all just part of the act.

He speaks with this shaky determination in his voice, standing his ground but all too ready to be easily blown over. His words tell Ryan that it’s a statement and a fact, but in his heart Matt is, in actuality, just pleading for Ryan to agree.

“Don’t do this to me,” Matt adds on, begging. This facade of being strong enough to fend for himself has faded with a snap. He’s back to being a coward. He’s afraid. He wants Ryan to snap out of it, too, but for a whole few seconds that drag on quietly, things don’t seem to be looking up. Ryan has his hands in his pockets, and is oddly still. There is rainwater still dripping from his sopping jacket onto the church’s floor, droplets rolling down the sides of his face. He looks too solid to be moved. 

“You’re just creating problems for me at this point.” Ryan says. His tone is even and void of feeling, but the words are still so painfully sharp.

“I wish I never met you.” And then he just stares at Matt, blank and barely blinking- like he means it, like he really,  _ really _ means it, and _God_ , this can’t be happening.

It’s something of a last ditch effort. A fight or flight response is triggered within Matt. The words that he won’t even admit to himself come pouring out of him like the rain from the gushing water spouts outside. The truth hurts more in this moment than he thought it would. It hurts more than it should.

“I like you, Ryan.” Matt admits, and he thinks he should be feeling braver than he does in this moment for making this kind of confession. He inhales a trembling breath after he says it, as though his body is recovering from being so full of raw feeling. It’s like there’s a weight on his chest that makes it harder to breathe, even though finally admitting this out loud should really have him feeling lighter.

It’s this realization and affection and relief and _fear_ , all swirling in him at the same time, and his fingers shake with it. Matt can barely cope with the uneasiness of now having to face these emotions that he’s had but kept tucked away for nearly a whole summer, like a sunburn away from the daylight. He’s wrought with all of it, but right in this moment, though, Matt is just focused on letting Ryan know. Because that will surely make him come to his senses, right? The night in the pool, the hand-holding, all of their quiet nights and small moments together- that all couldn’t have just been a string of meaningless coincidences.

Right?

“I-I  _ really _ like you. Really, and I… I thought you liked me too.” Matt whispers pathetically, dreadfully. He’s stupidly heartbroken, blinking tears down his cheeks, but Ryan doesn’t even flinch.

A dismissive and shallow shake of the head is all that he receives as a response. Right there in that moment, Matt decides that maybe he’d be better off pretending that he really  _ hadn’t _ ever met Ryan at all.

Matt has an urge to raise his voice, to cry in frustration, and to head towards the door all at the same time. He’s never had to deal with an emotional endeavor of this nature before. The best option, Matt thinks, acting quickly so as not to have a complete breakdown, is to just leave for now. Escape the cause of turmoil so that he doesn’t say or do anything that he regrets- and because it doesn’t seem like Ryan is all that up for changing his mind. Matt isn’t going to stick around to make a fool of himself, wallowing in the feelings he’s spilled, if his efforts are going to remain fruitless.

He turns away quickly, and walks in the opposite direction of Ryan, towards the altar, just _away_. Retreating from Ryan when he just wants to be near him is the ripping of a painful, stinging bandage. But even this is different than the sharpness that a bandage leaves behind, because that eventually gives way. It throbs and smarts, but even the patronizing rosy pink sting on the skin fades, and the feeling retreats. Something like this, something like this hurt and heartbreak and betrayal, it weighs heavy in the limbs. It leaves the head weightless, all dizzy and unsteady. Something like  _ this _ kind of pain feels as though it might not ever subside.

“Where are you going,” Matt hears Ryan ask from behind him, and Matt is surprised that he’s speaking at all. Matt turns around partially to peer at him, with his own eyes still full of glassy tears and the tracks on his cheeks still wet.

Ryan’s voice is still stern and gruff with a harsh anger, or resentment, or _something_. But there’s an underlying desperation to it, something Ryan’s attempting to keep masked. Some sort of emotion out of Ryan other than a sullen sense of venom is all that Matt could wish for in this moment. Suddenly, though, he can’t find it in himself to care.

“Anywhere that you aren’t.”

Matt turns his head again, and looks towards the back doors as his way out. He wonders, a prominent thought in the forefront of his mind, if Ryan has ever even seen him this angry. Angry is a word for it- confused, upset, betrayed, those would all work too. 

There were times when they’d meet up, and so easily Ryan could tell what kind of mood he was in, was so tuned into the fine details that Matt thought no one would notice. Often after passively mentioning that it was usually, “Just another argument with his dad,” Ryan would ask why Matt wouldn’t just get _mad_. He would tell Matt to talk back, to stand up for himself, not unlike the way that Matt had seen Ryan himself do on more than one occasion. Matt hopes it’s as bitter of a realization to Ryan as it is to him, that now, Ryan’s suggestions are being well considered, and put to good use.    


Matt freezes for a second when a hand touches the back of his arm, fingertips lightly grasping close to his elbow. His heart feels as though it stills just as suddenly as his body does, but the recovery is quick. The response is impulsive.

“Don’t touch me.” Matt all but whispers, shrugging away from the contact. He bites his tongue in some vain attempt to hold back pathetic tears, as though they haven’t already spilled over. Maybe it’s to bite back all the other words that are also threatening to spill out. _Hold me_ , he wants to say, because his heart has been quietly begging him for it. As he lets himself realize and latch onto the romantic idea of Ryan, after letting the confession finally fall free, he’s finding that he  _ needs _ him. 

He wants Ryan to to keep his hand tightly clutched, for Ryan to sweep away the eyelashes that fall on his cheek. Matt wants to have Ryan’s hands through his hair, and to feel his heartbeat humming as their chests press together. He wants Ryan to run his fingers along the sensitive skin on the inside of his wrist late at night until he falls asleep, to trace patterns along the length of his spin when he’s sad. Matt really  _ wants _ Ryan to touch him.

“Just… Just don’t.”

Matt knows he shouldn’t leave Ryan alone, but he goes anyway, because it’s all he knows to flee. His father might look for him later when he finds that he’s gone, and might keep an even stricter hold on him as consequence. But he doesn’t care right now. It’s raining, but a cold, wet shirt is no match for his chest feeling so tight and heaving.

Pain is an animal with sharp teeth and a soft heart. Pain is the way that Ryan’s fingers were grasping at Matt’s skin as he was fleeing. Pain is how Matt can’t really stand to walk away, but just doesn’t want Ryan to see him cry anymore.

\--

Without a routine, it’s easy for Matt to get lost. Maybe calling his erratic and often spontaneous hang-outs with Ryan anything close to “routine” is a little glorifying, but _still_. Having a companion during the summer was better than feeling so trapped under his father’s gaze. He could call the assisting his mom with chores, shutting himself away while trying to focus on the words in a book, and boring nights spent idle and isolated in the sanctuary a routine, sure. But the way his summer’s script has suddenly become so flipped doesn’t aid him in feeling any less misplaced. 

When he was with Ryan, Matt realizes he was starting to have a place where he felt he belonged. In this church, with his dad and God, and his mother and Chris, and anyone else pretending to have his best interest in mind- this isn’t where he’s supposed to be. No amount of preaching or insistence that it’s “God’s plan” could convince Matt otherwise.

Mostly, Matt has a lot of time to think. His first instinct was to try disregarding the swarming bouts of emotionally charged thoughts and whims that won’t stay out of his head. He’s already been put in his place, faced the worst of Ryan, and been made to feel the most alone he has in a while. Matt doesn’t  _ want _ to think about it. But as the days went by, he quickly realized that talking only briefly and tersely with his father and mother throughout the week wouldn’t be enough. If he didn’t allow his mind to wander and break free from its dull and confined cycle, then he might just end up losing himself.

All of the times he questioned himself really start to make sense, now. Why he didn’t feel so completely disgusted by the idea of kissing a boy, why the thought of losing Ryan could so easily nearly bring him to tears. Even just a few days ago, when the man at the liquor store was trying to provoke them, calling them awful names- Matt wasn’t all that bothered by the insults. More rather, he was worried about being in danger more than he was ever focused on some drunk stranger thinking that he and Ryan were a couple.

Matt doesn’t know how feelings like this are supposed to go, if there’s a way that he should and shouldn’t think about it all. He wishes he had some experience, something to base a plan of action or thought process on. A lackluster encounter with a girl at an 8th grade dance years ago won’t help him in this case, though, and couldn’t be classified as even remotely romantic. Matt has always been afraid. Matt has always been unsure of what to do with himself. He hates to to think that he’ll always rely on other people, but being separated from Ryan is really making him think about how much he seems to need him. How he depends on him, in one way or another.

Matt never thought that he would miss the familiar smell of the tiny abandoned place in the woods, or the smell of his dingy house, or his cigarette smoke. He does, though, and he’s becoming aware all too quickly that the little things that he took for granted are what mattered to him the most. He wants to hear the shake of a spray paint can, or the click of his lighter, or all the curse words Ryan wouldn’t hesitate to say. And he wants to take chilled fingers between his own, or even try to remember what it was like to have Ryan’s lips on his own. His mind runs in countless circles, and he feels like he’s losing some part of himself. He feels like he wants everything to be back to the way it was, but also wants to forget Ryan entirely- all at the same time.

The more Matt dwells on the hurt that he’s feeling, trying to figure out why Ryan suddenly felt it so necessary to break his heart apart and tell him such awful truths, the worse it becomes. So he decides to direct his thoughts in the other direction. Maybe this was what Chris had been trying to warn him of all along. After all, he did tell Matt that he didn’t know Ryan as well as he thought he did. Could this be what he meant? Could Chris of all people have know better than anyone that Ryan was just bound to end up pushing people away, and hurting them without remorse in the end? Matt doesn’t want to believe it, and a gut feeling tells him that he doesn’t. But he’s sick of being so upset by the loss and rejection, and he’s almost willing to latch onto anything at this point that makes him feel like he didn’t make such a huge mistake by ever getting attached to Ryan at all.

On day four, after over half a week of lingering in the same thoughts and feelings, Matt tells himself that this is for the best. He tells his father that he’s sorry. He kneels by the altar to formulate an imperfect prayer, telling God that he’s sorry. And Matt tells himself that Ryan was no good from the start, that this sort of thing was bound to happen. Matt tells himself that he doesn’t care, that his own feelings were just something conjured from infatuation, and that having Ryan out of his life is what’s best.

He really tries to believe it all, too.

On Thursday, later into the evening, Matt decides he needs a walk to let his thoughts mellow out a bit. He doesn’t have a direct course, so when he ends up in the shabbier part of town, he knows that it wasn’t by choice. This is just the area he’s grown to be familiar with, all the potholes and the sabotaged street signs. When he ends up nearby the tobacco shop, Matt hates that he ends up wishing that Ryan would emerge from its door. He stands outside of it for maybe a little too long, though he shouldn’t be there in the first place. The sight of its barred windows and the fading lettering of its sign do nothing to make Matt feel any better. 

The day after Ryan ended up punching the drunk that was pestering them in the middle of the parking lot, a bruise showed along the knuckles of his right hand. Matt got frustrated when Ryan wouldn’t stop poking it, prodding the darkened skin even after continuing to wince every time. Matt thinks about that now. If you keep pressing your fingers into a bruise, will it ever get any better?   


\--

Matt wishes there weren’t reminders of it all. He hates the smell of cigarette smoke more than ever, because all he can think of is the one person who doesn’t want anything to do with him. He hates the prayer garden in front of the church because he recalls planting flowers there when he and Ryan were just getting to know each other. Most of all, though, he hates spending so much time around the church. Because there, he’s faced with his father, the threats of God’s punishment for his disobedience, and Chris. The place he used to think of as a safe-haven has now become a place of dread.

It’s been a whole week of no contact with Ryan, a week since Ryan told Matt to stay away for good. A week to adjust to the shock of having someone he cares so much for shutting him out, locking the door, and throwing away the key. He just tries keeping his mind occupied.

Voluntarily, Matt visits the church on the morning of the senior’s monthly breakfast, because a room full of rambling old people will serve as the best distraction, he’s sure of it. And who better to keep him occupied than Martha Sinclair? Matt spots her amongst the fair-sized crowd of early risers and approaches her on his own, saving her the trouble of hunting him down with her walker in hand.

“Ms. Sinclair, how are you today?” Matt greets her, smiling in a way that feels a little forced. Though, he guesses it’s usually forced whenever he speaks with her and he can’t manage to escape. That must be what it is.

“Oh, fine. Robert’s gone missing again, but I’m sure he’ll turn up.” She seems a little disconcerted at the fact, but distractedly so, as though she can’t exactly remember who Robert even is. Matt is racking his brain to also try and figure out who exactly Robert is, and if he should even know. Something in him is telling him it’s Martha’s poor cat, but he can’t be sure. Thankfully, Martha moves on before he can get a chance to mistake an elderly person for a cat.

“Where’s your friend at today?”

Matt’s throat suddenly feels a little tight, and his forced smile even tighter. He doesn’t want to assume she’s talking about the one person he’s really trying to forget.

“Who, Chris? I’m not sure, he might be getting ready to go back to grad school soon.” He tells her, and seems to also tell himself. It’s a relief of a realization to remember that Chris shouldn’t even be in town for much longer, and shouldn’t be anywhere for Matt to accidentally and uncomfortably run into. Matt only wishes that all of his problems could just float out of his life that easily.

Martha shakes her head, the earrings hanging heavy from her ears swaying with the movement. “No, that other boy. Did you bring him here again? I didn’t get a chance to speak with him the last time.”

Matt has a pit in his stomach, and it feels dark and ever-growing. If he’s honest, it hasn’t really gone away for about a week now.

“Uh, no, we… We aren’t really friends anymore.” He tells her, because that’s the easiest explanation, no questions asked. He doesn’t know if he’d be able to stomach delving into the details of it even if he  _ did _ feel comfortable telling her, or anyone, the truth. It’s embarrassing and makes him feel like an idiot, for believing in someone and trusting them, and developing  _ feelings _ for them. No, Matt wouldn’t tell her, or even God, about what’s troubling him. He hates to think that God could already be watching and knowing of every detail.

“Well that’s a shame,” She says, but Matt’s not listening as intently as before. He feels distracted, and like he’d rather be anywhere but here while dwelling on this for another useless moment with no resolution. 

“Are you sad?” She asks, but her tone is more curious than sympathetic. Matt stares at her, looks at her frail face, and wonders how many times she’s been sad in all her years of life, too.

“I… Yeah, a bit.”

_A bit_ , he says, as if he needs to play it down. As if Ms. Sinclair of all people will judge him for the way he feels. She might just be the only person around these days who won’t. He finds himself locking eyes with her, and she seems so genuine and sincere without even saying a word. Suddenly, Matt thinks that if she doesn’t stop looking at him like that he just might start crying. The last thing he wants is to keep shedding tears over someone who isn’t even remorseful in the slightest.

“Well I hope things work out between you two.” She tells him with a smile, and Matt wishes his immediate impulse wasn’t to roll his eyes at the sentiment. Something tells him that with everything trying to keep them apart, including Ryan himself, things couldn’t really go back to the way they were.

Martha looks thoughtful for a minute as Matt must twist his face into a frown, and then she continues on. “I’ve had a lot of friends come and go in my life, but sometimes you have to stop them from going yourself. Sometimes you need to show them the mistake they’re making and what they’re missing out on.”

And Matt wants to roll his eyes again. He wants to explain the stupid details to her. He wants to tell her that of  _ course _ he’s thought of trying to convince Ryan to change his mind, but that it’s not that simple. He wishes she just knew the way Ryan spoke to him, what he said to hurt Matt in a deep way that doesn’t leave him be. She wouldn’t still suggest that he “stop Ryan from going” if she was aware of how it all went down, he’s sure of it.

But he can’t help the way his mind wanders.

Matt  _ hates _ that beyond the doubt and feeling sorry for himself, he actually has some sort of  _ hope _ in him still. Because Ryan made sure to say whatever he needed to say that would hurt the most, and he made it clear that he doesn’t want anything to do with Matt. Yet, Matt can’t help but wonder- what if Martha is right? What if he needs to stop Ryan from going himself, to show him what he’s missing? They spent the whole summer together, surely it shouldn’t be made to end so suddenly and so soon. 

It’s wishful thinking to expect someone as stubborn as Ryan to even be willing to listen to Matt speak at all, let alone be made to feel any differently. But there’s a question of  _ what if _ that’s playing on a loop in his head, and suddenly he can’t think of anything else.

Matt came to the breakfast for a little distraction from Ryan, yet he ends up leaving the church later that afternoon with nothing on his mind but him.

\--

It’s stupid that this is familiar. It’s stupid that Matt is now used to feeling so distant from Ryan, and like he’s wasting time, and like this might all be for nothing. Early on when they were still hardly acquaintances, Matt was marching over to Ryan’s place to give him a piece of his mind. Now, he’s just trying to win him back.

Maybe he feels silly for hardly even lasting a week and a half without Ryan at his side, but Matt’s hardly focusing on that. He’s mostly, for now, just trying to remain latched onto that same _what if_ , because it’s the only thing giving him hope right now. Matt’s used to being afraid, but he doesn’t want to get talked out of this by his own fear.

But he does have a lot of time to think. It’s the middle of the night, Matt having crept quietly out his front door again once it was late enough. He should be sleeping, the way his parents are, unaware that their son is running off to some awful boy he likes just to probably get his heart stepped on again. Matt doesn’t know that he’d be able to sleep tonight even if he did stay in, though, because Martha planted the thought in his head and it’s sprouted into fully grown weeds that won’t leave him alone. His mind is as busy as ever, now that he’s giving into the urge to dwell on it, and think about it, and  _ question _ all of it.

On the way over, Matt is trying to imagine every possible scenario. He wants to go about this rationally, to tell Ryan that they were good for each other, and actually try to convince him of it, too. If he just delves face-first into an argument by accusing and calling names, then this won’t work. Matt’s not sure it’ll really work at _all_ , considering Ryan told him he never even  _ liked _ him, but Matt’s convinced himself that isn’t true. If only to have his heart stay a little less broken.

So he thinks up these back-and-forths, thinking of what Ryan might say, and what Matt could do to help his case. But then he thinks of the way Ryan treated him. Matt remembers when Ryan admitted to punching a hole in the wall, when he’d been actively  _ avoiding _ Matt just because of Chris. And he thinks of how Ryan left him hanging, and left him feeling unwanted. And when Ryan did finally come around on his own, it was to tell Matt to back off, and to spout some - hopefully - made up story about how much Matt didn’t matter to him. And it’s all such _bullshit_.

He really wanted to go about things the right way, but by the time Matt’s at Ryan’s door, he doesn’t feel like being polite. He doesn’t feel like being  _ nice _ to Ryan, of all things. Matt decides against lightly tapping on the door in favor of knocking with a heavier hand. Matt likes the way it sounds as though, instead of asking for reconciliation, he’s demanding that Ryan listen.

If he’s honest, Matt didn’t expect Ryan to even answer. He can see the lights are on through the living room’s blinds, but he would have stood there knocking for a decent amount of time before eventually giving up. The door does open, though, and faster than Matt would have thought. On a regular day, Matt might have cowered away at the cold expression on Ryan’s face. He might have lost his will to argue for something that might as well already be lost, and might have just shrank in on himself in resignation. But tonight, seeing Ryan looking so blank and void, as though  _ nothing is wrong, _ while Matt has been fighting just the mere thought of him so he doesn’t start tearing up- it’s frustrating. Infuriating, even. He worked himself up on the walk over, and with Ryan’s current stance, Matt is, for the first time that he can recall, properly _angry_.

“Who the hell do you think you are?” There’s no hello or greeting, because Matt doesn’t feel like he owes Ryan one. He feels instead like he should be pointing an accusing, stabbing finger- but he doesn’t want to flail his hands around like a child. He crosses his arms to keep his hands to himself, though the want to point fingers is still prominently there.

Ryan’s stony facade cracks a little as he looks a little taken aback, and Matt can’t help the way that he  _ likes _ it. So he keeps going.

"Why do you  _ do _ this shit to me? You yell at me, you fucking... you vandalize the church, you punch people, you shoplift candy bars you don't even like! You don't even  _ like _ Snickers, who fucking does that?!” 

He doesn’t have to build the nerve to let go of a curse word. He doesn’t wince at it, or whisper it like he’s afraid of his parents hearing. It springs free with force and purpose, because he’s upset, and he wants Ryan to know. Ryan does still look so blank and still, almost as though he’s made himself revert back to his emotionless act, keeping people always so that he can't be vulnerable. Matt feels his heart tugging at the idea of Ryan feeling the need to shut everyone away, but he thinks Ryan still deserves more reprimanding before he deserves sympathy.

“I don’t get why you’re so worked up about this.” Ryan dares to say, finally speaking. And Matt thinks it’s safe to say that he’s fuming. 

"You don't get- God, I hate you!” He says it and doesn’t feel like saying sorry. Maybe because he means it. Maybe because he and Ryan can both tell that he doesn’t. 

“I  _ really _ hate you, but I can't even get  _ away _ from you. I think about you all the time, a-and there are parts of you that I see in myself. You made me just like you. You curse, and smoke, and drink, you're so mean and rude and loud," Matt realizes he’s spewing a stream of consciousness, everything he’s thought about and can’t  _ stop _ thinking about. His mouth can barely keep up with his thoughts, but he doesn’t find himself wanting to slow down. The words are coming out shakier now, though, and his eyes betray the anger he’s trying to project by filling with these pathetic and frustrated tears.

"And you're selfish, you don't care about anybody but yourself, you steal stuff and you’re so  _ mean _ to people, and you- I don't know why I have _ feelings  _ for you.”

Ryan remains quiet, and as Matt stands there, looking at him in the doorway while his heart races, he wishes that Ryan would speak up. Say something so that he doesn’t have to be angry anymore.

Ryan just stares and stares, blinks in a way that seems like he can't believe that Matt is real and in front of him. “What… What kind of feelings?” He eventually asks, slowly and almost cautiously. To Matt, it sounds as though he’s trying so hard to sound indifferent, trying to keep up the act of pretending not to care. But his voice wavers slightly, and Matt even thinks he sees something change in his eyes, sees them become softer or more curious. Or hopeful.

It makes Matt a little confused, and nervous, and still upset, because what kind of question even is that? Wasn’t he clear enough that night in the church? Does he really have to pour his heart out for Ryan to understand what he means? Apparently, because the words, “I like you,” weren’t enough. It seems as though Matt is going to have to spell it out for him.

“I don’t know, Ryan, I just- I  _ like _ you.” Matt answers simply, because it’s all new and strange for him and he can’t really  _ place _ any of it. 

”I just want to- I want to hold your hand all the time,” Matt begins, trying to articulate his thoughts even when he himself can hardly get a good grasp on them. And suddenly he doesn’t feel so angry anymore, or brave enough to look Ryan in the eye.

“I want to take care of you when you're sick, and make you quit smoking, and make sure you're never sad enough and on your own again to cry, or to be so hard on yourself. I want you to be happy. You make  _ me  _ happy.” 

Matt is focused on a chip in the doorframe, his eyes flitting back and forth while they trace over memories in his mind. The few tears that spill over his cheeks then are unexpected, but not surprising. Matt doesn’t wipe them away, but just laughs, dry and humorlessly, and braves to look back up at Ryan. To gauge his reaction, to find out if he should leave, to know if all of this is even  _ worth _ it. It happens almost abruptly, emotionally charged and unplanned words bubbling up out of his chest because he can’t seem to keep it all in anymore.

“But I just don't  _ get  _ it! I don't know why it's- why  _ any _ of this feels the way it does, why it’s _you_. You don’t even like me  _ back _ and you’re so awful, you’re such a-,” Matt’s hands are shaking, the same way he’s shaking his head at himself; like he can’t believe himself for doing this, or for feeling this at all. The tears are falling freely now, and Matt hates how much he’s been crying in front of Ryan lately. He bets that it’s not helping his case and, if anything, make Ryan think even less of him. Matt is weak for crying, for feeling so strongly about someone who doesn’t even want anything to do with him anymore.

He can’t help the way he sort of just leans in towards the doorway, because his legs feel so weighted, but also like they’re not enough to support him anymore at the same time. It’s a rush of a relieving feeling when Ryan pulls him in close before he can even think about falling, exhausted by his own heart.

  
“A jerk, I know.” Ryan finishes for him, and Matt lets go of this confined sob, because this feels like Ryan letting go. He always has some need to feel like the toughest guy in the room; it’s why he fights people that look at him funny, why he wears all black and snarls at police officers. Through the long, dragging moments of Matt standing on his front steps with a heavy heart, it seemed as though he was acting like he’d rather be somewhere else. But now he has Matt against him, his arms wrapped around the middle of his back, and it seems like he’s okay with acknowledging his feelings. If only just for now.

Matt might’ve just stood there in Ryan’s open door forever, if it meant he could feel grounded and like Ryan actually _cared_. But Ryan moves after a few moments of just holding Matt, and they retreat inside.

Now sitting on a familiar spot on Ryan’s couch, left with an aftermath of puffy eyes and a stuffy nose, Matt feels silly for crying. He doesn’t know where this leaves them, but he just accepts Ryan’s offer of cheap toilet paper in place of tissues and figures some time to cool down for now might be best. He has questions, but if he jumps into another emotional rant, he’ll wear himself out for sure.

He’s just surprised that Ryan takes to answering all his questions before he can even ask them.

“I guess I should explain some things to you,” Ryan says, sighing and sitting down next to Matt on the sofa. Matt wonders if he meant for it to sound so ominous. Matt’s heart picks up speed again either way, and he’s afraid for what Ryan’s next words might be. He just doesn’t want to be let down again, because if he’s honest, with all of this up and down, he’s being worn too thin.

“I really... I didn’t want to fuck up your life. I know you think Chris was just saying whatever he could to get you away, but there’s a reason no one hangs around me anymore. There’s some truth to what he’s saying, that I just- I get in the way of things. I ruin things for people.”

Matt stares at Ryan’s knitted eyebrows, stares at Ryan’s bowed head and fidgeting fingers, and all of the worry that’s managed to manifest into a single, undeserving person. He wants to be done with the tears, but upon seeing Ryan so upset, and hearing him talk about himself in this way, Matt thinks he could start crying again.

“How could you possibly ruin my life?” Matt asks, because as far as he’s concerned, it’s only gotten better since Ryan came along.

“I don’t know, fucking up your relationship with your dad? Or with the church? Or _something_ , I don’t know. The stuff that’s important to you.”

“You’ve become so much more important to me than either of those things ever were.” Matt tells him sincerely, and he wishes Ryan would  _ look _ at him instead of down at his hands. Ryan’s biting his lip, but Matt can see the way his teeth start to show in a smile. He considers that progress at least.

“Chris was a problem too, though. It wasn’t just- I liked that you were spending time with me instead of at the church. I guess it was selfish that I didn’t care that you were falling away from your religion, but I just wanted you around. It only really got serious when Chris showed up and starting fucking everything up.”

Matt exhales a little shakily, and his eyes wander over to the imperfect hole in the wall by the dining table. He nods, because he knows. He hates that there has to be more than one discussion about how awful Chris has been, or that there has to be one at all.

“Oh right, that.” Ryan says as he follows Matt’s gaze. “I guess I wasn’t totally honest about that, either. When he came over that night, he wasn’t just harassing me, but trying to hook up with me.”

“What? But I thought you guys broke up?” Matt asks worriedly. If Ryan had been conspiring with the enemy this whole time, then it made everything a lot different.

“Well, yeah, we did, but he’s done that sort of thing before, where he just comes back around when he wants something. And I think that… Normally, I probably would have said yes and given in, but I actually told him  _ no _ for once.”

Then his voice comes out even lower, all quiet and profound, and he tells Matt, “Because I couldn’t stop thinking about you.”

It’s a new feeling for Matt to experience his heart surging so much at just a few simple words, but he doesn’t think it can be helped. And he wouldn’t want to feel any different even if he  _ could _ calm the way his chest seems like it’s expanding in the best way possible.

“I told Chris that too, though, which was when he really got mad. I could feel myself, you know,  _ falling _ for someone who actually thought I was worth something, and I think he knew that all along. So he was jealous, and he didn’t get what he wanted for once, which made things, uh, bad. Obviously.”

“So did he actually punch the hole in the wall?”

“Yeah,” Ryan says, sighing. Matt wonders if it’s a sigh of relief, that he’s glad to finally drop the lies, or if it’s just distress from remembering everything he’s been made to deal with. If he had to guess, Matt bets it’s a mixture of both.

“He kind of came after me, which, I don’t know, it’s not like it’s never happened before. I know how to stand my ground with him. Or… At least know how to punch back. But once he was worn out he just told me to stay away from you, or that he’d make both of our lives harder.”

“So that’s why you were avoiding me? Why didn’t you just say all of this before? Why would you hide something like that?” Matt means to sound accusing, but he mostly just has this fragile edge to his voice, like he’s more upset that Ryan thought he needed to keep secrets than he’s mad at him.

“ _Because_ , Matt. I don’t care if Chris beats me up. I don’t _care._ But if you got hurt... I knew that if I didn’t just do what he said then that’s what would end up happening. I fucking  _ hated _ having to tell you all of that at the church, but I figured that if I said things that I knew would hurt you, then you wouldn't want anything to do with me. And it’d be easier to just stay apart.”

He shakes his head, and then leans to rest his head in his hands, his elbows on his knees. 

“So, you didn’t mean any of that stuff?” Matt’s tone is somewhere in between hopeful and heartbroken. It hurts that Ryan wanted to push him away, but the remorse he’s showing for it now is enough to slowly start mending Matt’s heart back together.

“Fucking- no, of course not. And I’m sorry. I hate that I thought it was a good idea. Chris was on my case and I didn’t think it through.”

Matt still has a wad of toilet paper clenched in his hand, and he thinks he’s going to have to ask for some more. A few tears drip down his cheeks, because he’s sitting there thinking about how alone he was, and how trapped he felt, and how a week of feeling so awful was all for nothing. He’s less angry, and now mostly just let down. Matt would like to say that he’s built up a solid amount of trust in Ryan, and while it’s nice to know that Ryan is still there for him, the trust is full of cracks.

“You really hurt me,” Matt says, and doesn’t make a point to wipe the tear tracks from his face. He could be just tired of crying, and can’t be bothered- or he just wants Ryan to see.

“I know. I’m _sorry_.” Ryan says quietly, and reaches out tentatively to place his hand over Matt’s on the sofa, resting it there gently as if afraid that Matt will pull away. “Is there anything I can do to make it any better?”

The response comes almost immediately, some sort of impulse that Matt’s kept locked away up until now.

“Kiss me.”

And Ryan looks a little surprised at the quick answer, his eyes widening. 

“But you said-,”

“I know what I said.” Matt exasperates, closing his eyes and smiling dryly. He told Ryan once never to kiss him again, but right now it feels like it’s all he needs to be secure in this moment.

When he opens his eyes again, he looks up to Ryan’s face so that their eyes meet, and they’re left in this silence that’s slow, but not tense or heavy. Just waiting.

He can feel the urge to do it building up in him, weighing his hands down like lead, collecting into explosions of pins and needles and tiny spasms of _need_ , but he stays still. Matt can’t bring himself to go for it, can’t seem to bring himself to, as if it’s not the only thing currently clouding his mind, fizzling out all his other thoughts. 

He doesn’t surge forward to get it over with, and he doesn’t crash their lips together like two lovesick teenagers in a horrible romance movie. He starts in slow, unsure of why he’s nervous, leaning towards Ryan and expecting him to help fill the gap. But Ryan is unmoving. Maybe he’s still worried of doing the wrong thing, and he wants to make sure that this is all in Matt’s hands, entirely his decision.

Matt creeps in, moves forward on the couch, and he takes the time to place his hands on the spot where Ryan’s shoulders meet his neck. His fingers are splayed and calculated, all anxious about his movements because he can’t imagine doing this in a way that ruins it all, that makes Ryan or himself change their minds. He’s breathing with these stuttered breaths out of fear and the want to be intimate, the fight against himself for affection. But he keeps this moderately tight grip on Ryan’s shoulders still, because it seems to be doing a good job at keeping him grounded for now.

When their mouths press together, there’s still nothing like fireworks or something of a spark. Yet, Matt feels himself sighing and relaxing into it, and he knows that, despite his nerves, this feels right.

Matt ends up pulling away first, otherwise he thinks he may start to get overwhelmed. A week with hardly any attention straight to full-on contact like this is a big jump, and his heart is definitely letting him know that. He even feels a little too embarrassed to look Ryan in the eye, especially since the more they stay with their faces just inches apart, the warmer his cheeks become. He still has his hands on Ryan, and they’re just sitting there, close and breathing.

“Can you please just promise that you’ll, like,  _ talk _ to me about stuff like this from now on?”

Matt asks, expecting or at least  _ hoping _ for simple compliance from Ryan. He doesn’t think that’s asking for much. Ryan leans back a little, though, and his expression tells Matt that he’s more confused than anything.

“Wait, but- what about your dad? Didn’t he tell you that you can’t hang around me anymore?”

Matt rolls his eyes. “Yeah, he did, but I think I’m over it at this point. I don’t want anyone else telling me who I can and can’t like, it’s so stupid.”

“Even if it’s someone like me?” Ryan asks, and he has this little smirk as though he’s trying to keep it light hearted and to show that he’s joking. Matt can tell that there’s an edge of seriousness to it, though. Ryan’s actually asking if Matt is willing to anger his family and who knows who else, just for someone like him.

“Yes, even if it’s a jerk like you.” Matt assures him. “I hated not being able to talk to you, I don’t want that to happen again. Plus I… I kind of like kissing you.”

Matt eyes, which were previously staring off at a point over Ryan’s shoulders, now train directly onto Ryan’s own. Ryan looks a little incredulous at Matt’s confession, even after all of this. He seems stunned into a little bit of silence, like he can’t believe that someone  _ actually _ wants to kiss his swearing, ornery mouth, with its cracked lips and practiced frown. 

“I’m, uh, sorry. For being so stupid about all of this. I should have just told you. I guess I just figured you wouldn’t want to talk to me anyway because it made everything so complicated. Like I wasn’t worth the trouble or something.”

Matt shakes his head, and reaches his still slightly shaking hand up to rest on the scruffier part of Ryan’s cheek. He never thought he’d be one to actually  _ caress _ someone, or ever even have someone that he felt this way about. But the movement is natural, and he doesn’t want Ryan to feel alone anymore.

“You’re worth the trouble.” He tells Ryan simply. Matt’s not denying that Chris’s threats and his father’s punishments are troublesome, but letting him know that if anyone were to make worthwhile, it’d be him.

And Matt feels a little less scared this time - of feeling this way, of what may happen when his dad finds out, of _everything_ \- when Ryan’s lips turn up in a smile. He just smiles back, and leans in to kiss him again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> give me some thoughts! i went back and forth with this chapter and i'm still not sure how i feel about it lol.


	9. May Change

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this chapter is pretty short, but it's more of an epilogue kinda thing than actual plot. just tying up the loose ends and giving the boys something to move forward with. i didn't want to force a longer chapter out just for the sake of content. all that needs to be said is said, ya feel? 
> 
> anyway, it's the END and i'm SAD. i started this fic like a year before i ever even posted it and i kiiinda never thought i'd ever end up posting the whole thing, let alone have people that actually like it???
> 
> idk if anyone noticed buuuut i added the fic to a series called summerverse where i'm gonna post some in-universe one shots later on! i'm planning stuff about chris and ryan's relationship when they were younger, a follow up to this chapter, and maaaaybe even smut oooooo... just thought i'd mention in case anyone cares about other stuff related to the fic! no idea when, and also no promises... but in the near future. 
> 
> thank you sm to everyone who stuck around with it, i appreciate you babies. even if you're a silent reader (side eyes), thanks for reading at all!
> 
> the final awful ms paint gallery  
> [ryan's house](https://ibb.co/fWqXsp)  
> [the church](https://ibb.co/i7AAdU)  
> [entire town map](https://ibb.co/hNirk9)

With as much as Matt hates trouble, he’s surprised at how much he wishes that he had done something awful. He’s thought countless times about how he could have had a bag of those little pills confiscated from Ryan in his pocket, or even a pack of his cigarettes. Matt could have made it obvious that he and Ryan had been trespassing and spray-painting all summer like true hooligans. At one point, Matt almost even wished that he’d ended up punching Chris for everything he’d said and done, to kill two birds with one stone. Something illegal, something _bad_.

But Matt didn’t really do anything wrong, and that’s why when he’s inevitably chewed out by his father again, it makes it hurt all that much more.

The anger for the pastor feeling entitled to keep Matt on such a tight leash is still there. The frustration flares up when Matt tries defending himself, and defending Ryan, but can’t even get a word in. The residual fear of just never being good enough in his dad’s eyes hits him harder than it has in a while. But all those feelings are joined by a less familiar and confusing ache of sadness, too, Matt realizes as he’s talked down to. Matt stands up for himself and talks back, and announces that he’s through with caring what his parents want from him, but it’s a much more bittersweet feeling than he had imagined it would be.

As the lines in his father’s face seem to grow deeper while his skin gets redder, Matt has this sad realization that if this really is the final straw between them, then he never made it. After all the obedience and nights spent worrying about keeping those around him, and _God_ , happy, all that he was and tried to be never sufficed. Matt thinks that knowledge alone is worse than any shouted threat or insult from his dad.

To give himself a break, and to make it easier on his father, too, Matt doesn’t bother to stick around for very long after he lets it slip that he has feelings for Ryan. Because he doesn’t just _let it slip_ \- he announces it. It’s a song to be sung, some sort of  _ victory _ to finally have peace with his feelings instead of the constant inner turmoil he was faced with when he tried denying them. And it wasn’t exactly an easy feat to make peace with Ryan, either, so Matt is done making things complicated for himself, he’s decided. It’s scary to walk away from his dad’s seething figure on the front porch, and away from his mom who likely heard it all from inside the house. But the bittersweet feeling still has the sweet, and the hurt splits away at least temporarily as Matt moves on from this _house_ , and goes towards the place that feels much more like home.

“Are you okay?” Ryan asks when he opens the door for Matt, as if Matt even needs to bother knocking anymore. His polite habits are hard to kick.

It’s a simple yet sweet question- Ryan picks up on Matt’s bad mood before they even share any other words, and it’s an endearing thought to know that he cares. But something about Ryan’s genuine worry makes Matt feel worse somehow. Maybe because he just wishes that he could have some sort of sentiment like that from his family, and he knows that he’s just thrown any chance of that happening away.

“It’s- yeah,” Matt answers quickly, before he gets too far ahead of himself. He crosses the threshold into the house that could use more natural light and some better air circulation- yet he immediately feels more comfortable. Normally, Matt would retreat to the sofa, but he doesn’t feel like sitting right now, so he just stands stiffly in the living room like he doesn’t know what to do with himself.

“Where were you?” Ryan asks, but something about the way he says it makes Matt believe he probably already knows.

“Talking to my dad.”

“...Was he pissed?”

“Yeah. Especially when I told him how much I like you.”

Ryan doesn’t seem to react right away to that, but rather lets the realization kick in slowly with his expression eventually twisting to convey his surprise.

“You- you told him? About, like, you and me?” He asks, and seems to fumble for words near the end, like he’s not quite sure what to label their relationship as. It shouldn’t be as much of a grey area as it is, but Matt doesn’t blame him for being cautious or confused. Ryan clearly had a bad go of it with Chris, and trust issues can make anything messy. Regardless of that, though, Matt’s still easing himself into feeling this way towards anyone at all. So he gets it. They can cross the bridge of labels at another time.

“Well, yeah, I figured that if he was already mad at both of us then I may as well. And I just didn’t want it to be some big secret or something, even if when he did find out it would be years later. There’s just no point. I feel this way about you _now_.”

Ryan looks somewhat caught between sympathy and hesitant endearment at that. He still can’t seem to decide as he asks next, “So, what, you just told him that and walked off? It was that easy?”

“Well, kind of,” Matt shrugs, remembering it like a fresh wound that he wishes he could just cover up, “He was still in the middle of talking to me about Jesus and the Bible but I was fed up. I mean, I’ve  _ been _ fed up for a while, but I didn’t have anyone else to go to. I do now, though, so I came to talk to you.”

“Oh,” Ryan says blankly, before he starts to let his mouth turn up into a grin. “Well, I’m sorry your dad’s such a fucking asshole, but I’m glad that you wanted to come to me.”

Matt nods, and smiles back, albeit weakly. He wishes he didn’t feel so nervous about all of this still. Especially when he’s got something so important to say.

“I just- I wanted to talk?” He poses it like a question, as if Ryan would decline his offer. Matt feels like he has to give him the choice, though, to give him an out before he proposes such a spontaneous plan.

Ryan nods for Matt to go on, tilting his head a little with curiosity. Matt inhales to prepare himself, because he feels like if he doesn’t get it all out in one go then he’ll miss something, or mess it up somehow.

“I don’t think I want to stay here.” His words come out in a rush, but then he snaps his mouth shut because everything he was thinking of saying suddenly feels wrong. So much for telling Ryan all at once.

“What does that mean?” Ryan asks, and his tone is confused, but mostly unreadable. Matt really thought that by now he’d be better at judging how Ryan’s feeling than this.

“My parents have this trust fund set up for me, but I-I haven’t even really touched it since I graduated college, I’ve just been- I just figured I’d follow my dad around and he’d give me something to do around the church, I don’t know. I guess I’ve been lazy. But I thought that we could... go.”

“Go where?”

“Somewhere? A place that doesn’t have people like Chris or police officers that hate you or my parents that wish they had a better son?”

The blinds to the living room’s front window are all the way up, albeit crookedly, and Ryan has hair and streaming summer sun in his eyes as he just stands in place, shaking his head with his mouth open. Matt should have known that this was a bad idea. He doesn’t know why he assumed that just because they’ve kissed twice that Ryan would want to go anywhere with him. Maybe it’s not too late to just pretend that he was joking, or that he didn’t mean it. Maybe he could still run back home and apologize to his father.

“I don’t think you’ve really thought this through.” Ryan eventually says, though Matt’s still biting on the inside of his cheek like he’s waiting for a different response.

“I-I know it sounds  _ stupid _ but I feel like I can’t go home and… and  _ your _ house is basically like my own home at this point, I just thought that getting away from this town could be better.” There isn’t much sense or point to his words- Matt feels like he’s just talking to talk, because he can’t stand the silence. And because maybe, the more he talks, trying pitifully to sway Ryan’s answer, the more Ryan will realize how much he really means it. 

Matt’s overly aware of the fact that his voice is higher pitched and whinier than he means for it to be, making him sound like a child begging for something impractical. Maybe that’s exactly what he is, too, but despite the strong urge to just drop the subject and move on, he feels like he doesn’t want to quit. This is a bad, possibly  _ horrible _ idea, but they have to brave the risks of it all before it can turn into something _good_.

“It’s not stupid.” Ryan retorts, and three words have never eased Matt’s mind so much. Yet, they leave him feeling confused, too, because if Ryan’s not shooting him down, then where does that leave them on the subject?

“It’s not?” Matt asks, pathetic and hopeful.

“No, but you- even if we had a place to go, or found one, how would we get there?”

“We can figure it out.”

“You’ve never even lived on your own before, either, what if you realize you’re not ready to be totally independent?”

“I thought that maybe-,” Matt tries justifying his thought process, but Ryan is already on a roll, and interrupts him before he can say much more.

“And we argue all the fucking  _ time _ , Matt, what happens when you hate living with me, and then we’re both miserable?”

Matt can’t say that he didn’t think of all of Ryan’s points, just maybe not as in depth as he should have. He suddenly doesn’t feel as at ease anymore, and has that anxious feeling twisting up his gut all over again. He wants to retaliate or say something useful to help his case, but Ryan looks almost upset over just a few minutes spent talking about it. Matt doesn’t want to make it any worse.

Matt holds Ryan’s gaze for a few moments, and it’s as if they’re both trying to read each other’s thoughts so that they don’t have to fight about this. Ryan eventually shakes his head and turns away, though, walking off near the kitchen to pace around. Matt’s quickly learning that it’s what he does when he’s nervous.

“I guess I just didn’t think of it as such a bad thing, I’m sorry.” Matt eventually says, and it’s true. When he pondered all the setbacks, he saw them as just that- hurdles to overcome. He never thought once that getting out of a town that holds nothing for them could really be that bad, let alone eventually turn them both against each other. But he guesses he can blame that on his naivety, and his stupid hope for everything to always turn out okay. Matt just must not think these things through enough.

Ryan sighs, and he turns so that he’s facing Matt again. He doesn’t look angry, just a little frustrated. With himself, with Matt, or with the situation entirely, Matt isn’t sure, but he doesn’t really want to take a guess.

“I just don’t get how you could do this. Why would you fuck up your life by being with me.” Ryan says rather than asks, with his eyebrows furrowed and his voice all full of worry. He sounds different than before, less insistent and stern, and more shaky and unsure. Possibly even scared. Matt wonders how often Ryan tries covering up how he’s actually feeling for whatever reasons he thinks are worth it.

“Don’t say that,” Matt tells him, but his voice is soft more than demanding. The harder Ryan is on himself, the more Matt feels his own heart drop further down in his chest, all heavy with the weight of heartache. 

That’s a good sign for Matt to know that this is real, too. He didn’t know that someone else’s thoughts and feelings about themselves could affect him and his own heart so much. Matt knows by this that it’s genuine, sure, but he also has a creeping feeling that maybe he’s in too deep too quick, or in over his head. He likes Ryan too much to quit right now, and that might end up being a bigger downfall than he expects. For the time being, Matt ignores the lurking sensation of investing too much of himself, and tries focusing on what good has come from Ryan instead.

“You make my life _better_. We’ve been over this.”

“But I fuck things up, you know I do, you’ve seen it. I hurt people and I just- I’m fucking _inconvenient_. If you want to leave, I’m the worst person to bring along.”

Matt looks on incredulously at Ryan who’s decided again to keep his gaze averted. Matt wants to make him look.

“I don’t care about what you don’t like about yourself.” Matt says, and he takes a couple steps towards the kitchen where Ryan is still lingering, hanging around like he’s lost in his own home. Matt knows that this feeling of confidence that’s welling in his chest is new and maybe even misplaced, but he’s going along with it for now. If he can come clean to his father and make some indefinite promise to flee home all in one day, then he can definitely help Ryan love himself. Or at least try to.

“I don’t think about that stuff that makes you _inconvenient_ , or whatever you want to call it. I just look at you and… I don’t know, I just feel happy.”

“This is crazy,” Ryan mutters, and Matt’s unsure of if he’s talking to himself or not. He does lift his head, though, and looks at Matt again with his eyes narrowed in confusion, some sort of disbelief. As though after all of Matt’s efforts to be around him and  _ stay _ around him, his want to do this is disingenuous. 

“Why would you do this with _me_ _?_ ”

“It’s  _ for _ you. For both of us, I guess. I know that you don’t like your job and you hate most of the people in this town and that you could use somewhere new. I mean… I get it if you don’t want me along-,”

“Fucking- don’t say shit like that.” Ryan snaps a little frustratedly, laughing dryly like he can’t believe Matt would suggest that. It seems that self-deprecation isn’t allowed if it’s anyone doing it but himself.

“Come here,” Ryan tilts his head back in a quick gesture for Matt to lessen the distance between them. And Matt, always one to please, easily follows the direction.

Once stood in front of Ryan, waiting and expectant, Ryan looks him up and down once. Matt is flooded with embarrassment and a hint of anxiety almost instantly, unsure of how to react in a situation like this. Ryan must quickly spot the rising blush on his cheeks that betray him, too, because when his eyes flit back up to Matt’s face, the corner of his mouth starts to turn up.

He takes a half a step forward so that they’re closer, and he reaches a hand up to brush his fingers across Matt’s hot skin. Matt wonders if Ryan will always like to be like this, all close and touching. Matt also wonders if he was always like this _before_. He hates that his mind fills with imagined scenarios of Ryan and Chris, all contact and whispered words, but he can’t help it. This is all a new experience for Matt, new just in terms of Ryan. But Ryan’s done this dance before. Ryan could still be imagining that Matt is someone else.

“You really do blush easy, huh?” Ryan says, as if just hoping to make it even worse. Matt rolls his eyes because there’s nothing else he can do, nothing other than just stand there and be mortified by his own body’s reactions and feelings. He crosses his arms to feel a little less fidgety, but knows that it must make him look like such a child.

His blood only runs hotter when Ryan takes a light grip on Matt’s chin with his two fingers and closes in for a kiss. Matt is somehow still surprised by how nervous he gets from such a simple action. Maybe it’s not even the kiss itself, but knowing that Ryan actually wants him that really makes his heart race.

“It’s not stupid,” Ryan reiterates once he’s pulled away from the short peck. “I just care too much to fuck this up.”

“I thought you didn’t care about anything?” Matt asks, and he thinks distantly that he shouldn’t be feeling so smug for someone who’s still so flustered over a kiss. The smirk tugs at his lips anyway, though, and he doesn’t feel like fighting it.

“Well, yeah, not really but. You’re… I don’t know. You’re a lot to lose.”

If Matt thought there was ever a chance of his heart slowing back down, he’s realizing now just how mistaken he was.

“I get being freaked out because you aren’t sure what’s going to happen, but is that really that bad?” Matt asks, but the words almost sound surreal to him. They shouldn’t be coming from someone like himself, whose fear of the unknown was second only to God not too long ago. _God_ , the biggest unknown of them all. It’s strange for Matt to be the one convincing  _ Ryan _ of something for once, yet he feels like if there’s anything he should brave Ryan’s stubbornness and bad temper for, it’s this.

Ryan has this habit of dwelling in his thoughts, Matt’s come to notice, where it’s so clear that he’s way to deep in his own head yet staying completely silent and stoic on the outside. He stares at Matt with his dark eyes that dance around Matt’s face, like they’re searching for something. Matt wants to know what he’s thinking, if he’s giving himself a hard time, but he doesn’t think asking will do him much good. With Ryan, most of the time it’s a waiting game, and Matt’s slowly becoming accustomed to that as part of the deal.

“I _guess_...” Ryan begins, and before he can even finish his thought Matt’s hopes have shot straight up, along with his heart that’s caught high up in his throat. “If you do all the work of figuring out where to go, then I fucking  _ guess _ I’ll come along with you.”

“Really?” Matt asks, begging for confirmation, because he’d hate to be built up only to be let down. 

“Yeah, just nowhere too cold, I’m not shoveling any snow. And not Arizona, either.”

“Why not Arizona?” Matt tilts his head to the side a little, not unlike a confused puppy.

“That’s where Chris is going to grad school.”

Matt can’t help the way his face falls at the mention of the name, and at the idea that Chris is still on Ryan’s mind at all. But that’s part of his hope in doing this at all. Matt hopes that once they’re both off somewhere else, things will be different. Far enough from the church so that Matt never has a sick feeling in his stomach at the sight of a chapel or a Bible. Far enough from the town that raised Ryan as an angry and untrusting delinquent. In a different space with everything lifted off their shoulders, maybe Ryan won’t have to ever even say Chris’s name again.

“Okay, sure. Then definitely not Arizona.” Matt nods quickly, more than okay with throwing the idea of somewhere like Tucson or Phoenix away if it means that neither of them will get hurt anymore. 

He knows Ryan has tasked him with finding somewhere worthwhile, but he doesn’t really care where they end up. As long as he doesn’t have to wear his church clothes every Sunday, and Ryan’s along for the ride, then anywhere is fine with him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> give me sum final thoughts pls, i love u.
> 
> edit: there's now a part 2 in the series [here](https://archiveofourown.org/works/17655137) if you wanna read more :o)

**Author's Note:**

> if you liked this, i _plead_ that you leave me a comment and let me know what you thought! this fic has been in the works for a while and it's kind of my baby. i really value feedback and concrit, and since i've already got the rest of the chapters written, it'd definitely motivate me to post them faster. thanku


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